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04-APR-98 10:00 AM PST

Mars Global Surveyor made its first attempt to target a specific location on the surface of Mars yesterday and missed the target very slightly. The site of the Viking Lander 1 was the first target in the up coming set of four that will include Viking Lander 2, Mars Pathfinder and the Cydonia region. Global Surveyor came rather close, but the landing site was about 150 meters (500 feet) to the west of the edge of the long, narrow image that was to contain it. The image was well centered in the north to south direction. The width of the image was slightly greater than 5 km (3 miles). The flight team will continue its analysis of the targeting performance.

The sequence of events for the imaging of Cydonia was loaded on board the spacecraft yesterday afternoon. The detailed commands to control the imaging will be loaded in about 2 hours after the latest orbit determination has been completed.