NASA plans Mars launch next fall

WASHINGTON, Oct. 10 (UPI) -- NASA plans to launch a new exploration rover to Mars next fall, despite budget and technical concerns, a NASA official said Friday.

"All indications are that they're still on track for the '09 launch," Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program, said at a teleconference.

The space agency will review the mission's progress again in January, he said.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in charge of building the spacecraft, believes it needs an additional $100 million, on top of previous budget increases, to meet the current launch schedule.

The original $1.6 billion budget has already been increased to $1.9 billion, McCuistion said.

Agency officials are working with the White House and Congress on budget challenges and monitoring progress on hardware and software development, McCuistion said.

The rover, officially known as the Mars Science Laboratory, is part of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Mars Exploration Program, a long-term effort of robotic exploration of the red planet.

The rover -- a space exploration vehicle designed to move across Mars' surface -- will assess whether Mars ever was, or is still today, able to support life, even of microorganisms, NASA says.

The rover plans to analyze dozens of samples scooped from the soil and drilled from rocks to determine the planet's present and past climate and geology, NASA says.

The exploration program includes three previous successful landers -- the two Viking landers in 1976 and Pathfinder in 1997.