Viking 1 launched
AUG 20, 2015
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.031033
On this day in 1975 a Titan IIIE rocket took off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. On board was NASA’s Viking 1 probe, which was to make 11-month journey through space to land on the surface of Mars. Viking carried four instruments capable of detecting the chemical signatures of life. Three found no evidence; the fourth, the Labeled Release experiment, detected an ambivalent signal. Since the launch of Viking 1 40 years ago, the case that liquid water once flowed on the Martian surface has become stronger. The quest to find life there continues.
Date in History: 19 August 1975
© 2015 American Institute of Physics
