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10-APR-98 5:00 PM PDT

The Mars Surveyor Operations Project is proceeding with the implementation of its second cluster of targeted imaging at Mars. This cluster will target the two Viking Lander sites, an refined Mars Pathfinder landing site, and, because of the previous successful imaging of the "Face on Mars", a different area of the Cydonia region will be targeted.

On Sunday, April 12th, at 8:22 AM PDT and at 8:01 PM PDT, MGS will again attempt to image the sites of the Viking Landers on two consecutive orbits.

On Monday, April 13th, at 7:40 AM PDT, MGS will again attempt to image the site of the Mars Pathfinder landing. The coordinates of the site have been refined since the first imaging attempt.

On Tuesday morning, April 14th, at 6:56 AM PDT, MGS will again image a portion of the Cydonia region. Because the image of the "Face" was successful in the last attempt, the target area will be shifted slightly to the southwest of the "Face" to capture an image of the features known as "The City". This area contains features identified as "mounds", "city square", "pyramid" and the "fortress". The "city square" will the target point.

The same probabilities of success of 30% to 50% will apply to these attempts based on navigation uncertainties and spacecraft performance. Experience with the first cluster of targeted images has shown that winter weather in the northern hemisphere of Mars at this time causes hazy, surface frost and heavy cloud cover to be significant factors in the success of seeing the targets clearly. The weather effects are not included in the probability of success estimates.

Results of the Cydonia imaging will be posted on the Internet, in the same manner as in the first observation attempt, at approximately mid-evening Pacific Time on Tuesday, April 14th. If the landers are within the resulting images and can be identified, the image(s) containing it (them) will be released.