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ATTN: NASA Board of Directors

RE: 2003 Mars Lander Mission

Gentlemen:

Thank you for greenlighting the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s 2003 Mars Lander mission. We firmly believe this mission has a good chance of fulfilling its important scientific goals. Third time lucky!

As you requested here is some further information about the project. (NOTE: Two scale models of the lander were intended to be included with this report but we lost the first one and the second one blew up.)

  1. Each lander is fitted with several items designed to increase its chance of success. Specifically: a special compartment will contain a lucky rabbit’s foot and a horseshoe. (A subcommittee is looking over the possibility of including a four leaf clover, as this was overlooked before.)
  2. The landers will be equipped with long-range telescopes, so they will be able to study Mars from a distance should they happen to land on the wrong planet (such as Saturn, the one with the rings, or Venus, the one named after the naked lady).
  3. Sending an object from Earth to Mars has been likened to throwing a ring over a silver-dollar-sized target from a thousand miles away. The help motivate staff, everyone working on the project will be awarded their choice of plush stuffed animal upon successful completion of the mission.
  4. The landers themselves are painted green, so when their broken wreckage is strewn over the red Martian surface it will provide a pleasing "Christmas"-like effect.
  5. In the event that the landers go haywire and end up returning to Earth, they are well-equipped to (a) do battle with the Bionic Man or (b) deal with the apes who now rule the planet.
  6. All project engineers are currently being reviewed to ensure they’re the scientist kind and not the train kind.
  7. As you are aware this mission utilizes two (2) landers. This provides twin benefits: firstly, it doubles the chance of at least one lander successfully landing on Mars and not, for example, going "apeshit" and plunging into the Sun (the big bright one). Secondly, should the first Martian Lander fail that will be three in a row, which should end our losing streak with one lander to spare.

Again, thank you for greenlighting the project. We at Jet Propulsion are eager to continue exploring Mars. More importantly we have the proper attitude, and feel that should the landers make it to Mars that’s great, and if they don’t then, hey, you’ve got to laugh.