Mars flyby and rendezvous with the flyby segment transferring the crew over. (see also Mars Excursion Module (MEM)) Alternately, a flyby-only human mission is also possible, without detaching at Mars, but to slingshot around Mars and back to Earth. In July 1965, Mariner 4 achieved a flyby of Mars with a return of data, providing the public and scientists with dramatically closer images of Mars. During the flyby Mariner 4 took 21 pictures amounting to about 1% of the surface of Mars. Mars was not globally mapped until the Mariner 9 orbiter, which over the course of 1972 to 1973 took thousands
Mars landing faster than the landers could manage transmitting directly to Earth, which conserves valuable time on the receiving antennas. The first probe intended to be a Mars impact lander was the Soviet Mars 1962B unsuccessfully launched in 1962. In 1971 the Soviet Union successfully sent probes Mars 2 and Mars 3, as part of the Mars probe program M-71. The Mars 2 and 3 probes each carried a lander, both of which failed upon landing. They were the first human artifacts to touch down on Mars. Mars 2 lander impacted on Mars only, while Mars 3 was the first Martian soft