Stunning Pictures From Mars

NASA scientists showed off the sharpest picture ever taken of the surface of the Red Planet — and quickly promised even bigger, better photos showing more of the rust-colored landscape strewn with rocks surrounding the Spirit rover.

Just days into its three-month mission, Spirit transmitted its first color "postcard" home across 105 million miles of space to Earth on Tuesday.

NASA project managers were ecstatic with the initial results from Spirit's Panoramic Camera, or pancam, a stereo camera system that will give scientists an unprecedented view of the Red Planet's surface in the weeks and months ahead, reports CBS News Space Consultant Bill Harwood.

Spirit used its robot equivalent of 20/20 vision to capture the photo, which has three to four times the resolution of any other pictures ever taken of the Red Planet.

"My reaction has been one of shock and awe," said Jim Bell of Cornell University, the main scientist on the rover camera team, amid chuckles at the use of the Iraq War phrase.

CBS News Correspondent Jerry Bowen reports the pictures were so stunning that the reporters at JPL did something they rarely do and burst into applause.

Meanwhile, European space scientists were disappointed, as their Mars Express orbiter failed to pick up a signal from the Beagle 2 probe on its first attempt Wednesday, leaving mission control without word from the lander since it was spun off toward the Red Planet in mid-December.

Flying 195 miles above the site where the probe was to have landed, Mars Express reported no transmissions from the probe, which was programmed to emit a steady beep-beep-beep after it bounced to a soft landing on air bags.

Spirit should spend the rest of the week preparing to roll off its lander and begin prospecting its surroundings, possibly as early as Monday. Before then, it will continue snapping a full, 360-degree panorama of its surroundings and transmit it to Earth.

"This is just the tip of the iceberg of what you're about to see," Steven Squyres of Cornell University, the mission's main scientist, said Tuesday.

President Bush telephoned to congratulate the mission team, calling Spirit's successful landing on Mars over the weekend a "reconfirmation of the American spirit of exploration."

JPL Director Charles Elachi invited the president to visit the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Spirit mission manager Jennifer Trosper went one better, inviting Mr. Bush to try his hand at driving the rover. "But very carefully," Trosper said.

NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe announced that Spirit's landing site would be named Columbia Memorial Station, in memory of the seven astronauts who died in February in the space shuttle disaster.

"Spirit carries the dream of exploration the brave astronauts of Columbia held in their hearts," O'Keefe said.

A six-inch-wide plaque mounted on the pancam mast provides a tribute to the astronauts and their mission.

"As team members gazed at Mars through Spirit's eyes, the Columbia memorial appeared in images returned to Earth, a fitting tribute to their own spirit and dedication," O'Keefe said.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration said it has registered more than 1 billion hits on its rover-related Web sites, as computer users around the world log on to see more of the first pictures from the surface of Mars since the Pathfinder mission in 1997.

Spirit is half of an $820 million project. Its identical twin, Opportunity, should land on the opposite side of Mars on Jan. 24. The rovers, the size of golf carts, were designed to probe Mars for evidence it once might have been a warmer, wetter place conducive to life.

The postcard shows a vast plain scattered with a wide variety of rocks, including one in the far distance thought to be the size of a Volkswagen. Poking above the horizon, perhaps 16-19 miles away, a mesa could be seen standing against the reddish-pink of the Martian sky.

"After looking at these images, it leaves me a little bit speechless," said Jennifer Trosper, mission manager for surface operations.

NASA displayed the new image for reporters in high-definition television, a first for any pictures from another planet. A zoom-in showed off the crisp detail. Thousands of rocks peppered the scene, each blasted smooth by iron-rich dust lofted by the stiff winds.

"We don't have the slightest idea of what these rocks are made of yet," Squyres said.

Scientists were especially intrigued by the thin crust on top of the Martian soil.

"It's strangely cohesive. We don't know what holds it together," Squyres said. He speculated that evaporating water could have left salts behind that cemented the Martian soil together.

But he cautioned against jumping to conclusions.

"When the air bags deflate, all the gas gets sprayed out around the environment of the vehicle. It could be we contaminated the soil in this particular location," he told CBS News Early Show co-anchor Hannah Storm.

"One of the nice things of course about having the rover is we can drive away and receive some pristine materials," he said. "If we see the same thing then, then we'll investigate."

None of the rocks in the immediate vicinity of the rover stands more than 8 inches tall, making them small enough for Spirit to easily drive over.

Temperatures aboard the rover were higher than expected, and NASA turned off the craft's UHF radio to cool Spirit down. Once Spirit rolls into action, it should cool off further. Temperatures on the ground ranged from 32 degrees to minus-58 degrees Fahrenheit.

Engineers continue to study an intermittent spike in the current in one of two motors that drive the rover's high-gain antenna. None of the problems appeared serious, and Spirit remained in excellent health, NASA said.

"The object of our affection is doing quite well on the surface of Mars," said Firouz Naderi, manager of the Mars exploration program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. "This baby has skipped all the baby talk and gone right into full sentences."