Jim Crocker Team Quotations

We are absolutely delighted by the successful recovery of the Stardust samples. Years of planning, preparation and teamwork paid off handsomely this morning. We're very proud to have played a role in another of NASA's exciting voyages of exploration and look forward to learning what Stardust will tell us about the origins of our solar system.

We're extremely proud and excited to be partnered with NASA on this mission to Mars, adding to the fleet of spacecraft that are revealing the mysteries of our planetary neighbor. MRO has been performing extremely well over the past seven months and during this cruise stage and the team has been busy monitoring and calibrating many of the spacecraft systems and instruments as we prepare MRO for orbital insertion and its ultimate mission. The entire NASA, JPL and Lockheed Martin team is ready to perform this critical maneuver for MRO and we are looking forward to continuing this exciting voyage of space exploration and discovery.

The team continues to pull rabbits out of the hat.

That's not to say it's not challenging, ... but the team is making a convincing story.

This is a monumental achievement for NASA JPL and the space community. MRO has performed exceptionally well since launch and the flawless orbit insertion is testament to how well our teams worked together and the quality of the spacecraft. Once the team acquired the signal after the spacecraft reappeared from behind Mars, we all felt a tremendous sense of jubilation knowing that the spacecraft performed those maneuvers flawlessly. NASA and JPL now have another healthy satellite in orbit around Mars.