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PASADENA, Calif. (AP) -- NASA successfully trimmed the course of a Mars-bound rover on Friday, putting the spacecraft on track for an early January arrival at the Red Planet.
The first of as many as six trajectory correction maneuvers ``worked perfectly,'' mission manager Jim Erickson said from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
The maneuver involved a series of rocket firings that increased the spacecraft's velocity relative to the sun by nearly 32 mph _ enough to fine-tune its path for a Jan. 3 arrival.
NASA initially aimed the rover, called Spirit, slightly away from Mars to ensure the third stage of the rocket used to launch it did not trail it to the planet.
NASA aims to launch a second rover, Opportunity, from Cape Canaveral, Fla., early on Thursday.
The goal of the $800 million double mission is to send the twin wheeled robots roaming across the surface of Mars to prospect for minerals that could indicate whether the planet was once a warmer, wetter place hospitable to life. The rovers are to land on opposite sides of the planet.
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