[00:01.07]How long have we been observing Mars?
[00:04.11]Well, towards the end of the nineteenth century
[00:07.11]improved telescopes meant that astronomers
[00:09.39]could start to observe the surface
[00:11.27]of the planet.
[00:12.86]An Italian astronomer saw channels
[00:15.43]on the surface of the planet
[00:16.95]and this caused great interest.
[00:19.03]Unfortunately,6a translation made some English
[00:22.24]mistakes and people thought that "canals"
[00:24.89]had been found on the surface.
[00:28.10]This made people think about the possibility
[00:29.75]of life on Mars and "Martians"
[00:32.78]entered science fiction for the first time.
[00:35.71]In H G Wells' famous book The War
[00:38.74]of the Worlds of 1898,
[00:41.28]Martians are highly developed creatures
[00:43.55]with large heads that try to take
[00:45.60]over planet Earth.
[00:47.75]Right,now let's look at actual exploration
[00:50.69]of the planet.The first probe to get near Mars
[00:53.92]was Mariner 4,which flew past the planet
[00:57.21]in 1964 and took photos of it.
[00:59.96]After that,there were several failures,
[01:02.16]with probes crashing on landing
[01:04.37]or failing to get into orbit.
[01:07.04]The big breakthrough came with Pathfinder,
[01:10.23]which successfully landed on July 4,1997
[01:13.43]and sent back wonderful photos
[01:15.55]of the surface of Mars.
[01:17.54]These photos and the six-wheel vehicle
[01:20.13]which explored the area
[01:21.44]increased public interest.
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