Mars Exploration Program various components of the EDL systems on Earth-based testing. However, the costs of reproducing environments in which this data would be relevant in terms of Mars' environment are considerably high, resulting in testing being purely ground-based or simulating results of tests involving technologies derived from past missions. InSight, launched from Earth May 5, 2018, the lander touched down on Mars November 26, 2018 on Elysium Planitia. Mars exploration missions, as do most NASA missions, can be fairly costly. For example, NASA's "Curiosity" rover (landed on Mars in Aug 2012) has a budget exceeding $2.5 billion. NASA also has goals of
Mars Exploration Rover "Opportunity" marked six years on Mars, respectively. On January 26, NASA announced that "Spirit" will be used as a stationary research platform after several months of unsuccessful attempts to free the rover from soft sand. NASA announced on March 24, 2010, that "Opportunity", which has an estimated remaining drive distance of 12 km to Endeavour Crater, has traveled over 20 km since the start of its mission. Each rover was designed with a mission driving distance goal of just 600 meters. One week later, they announced that "Spirit" may have gone into hibernation for the Martian winter and might not