~Nasa's Phoenix spacecraft lands on Mars near its north pole.~Transmits pictures back to Earth.
~NASA scientists 'thrilled'.
~No obvious snow or surface ice, but permafrost suspected.
"If it wasn't for the brownish-red soil and the strangely coloured sky, it could be mistaken for frozen earthly terrain."
Phoenix, designed and operated by some of the world's finest scientific minds, came in for a textbook landing at 12:53am UK time (Sunday) following a risky, high-speed plunge through the Martian atmosphere in which it had stood only a 50-50 chance of survival.
Not only did Phoenix touch down safely, as only 45 per cent of previous Mars landers have done, it settled in an almost perfectly flat spot within a highly precise target range.
Dr Ed Weiler, Nasa's associate administrator for science missions, likened the pinpoint accuracy of such a landing to a golfer teeing off a ball in Washington and scoring a hole-in-one in Sydney, Australia.
"That's not a bad shot," he added.
Indeed.
That trip also alludes to the cosmic clockwork precision of this solar system which made the mathematics of such a 422 million mile journey possible. But pay no attention to the perception of design behind the curtain!
After opening its solar wings to harness energy from the sun and recharge its batteries, Phoenix swiftly hoisted its mast and swiveled its camera to photograph its new home.
Scientists hope Phoenix, only the sixth probe to safely reach the Martian surface, will use its 2.3-metre robot arm to scratch red planet's surface and find water ice. The arm is designed to scoop up the ice and melt it in one of eight tiny ovens.
Mars images stream in (+pics)
