Portal:Spaceflight/Selected article/Week 35 2008

Mars Express is a Mars exploration mission of the European Space Agency and the first planetary mission attempted by the agency. "Express" originally referred to the speed and efficiency with which the spacecraft was designed and built. However "express" also describes the spacecraft's relatively short interplanetary voyage, a result of being launched when the orbits of Earth and Mars brought them closer than they had been in about 60,000 years. (more...)