NASA Media Telecon Previews First Spacecraft To Orbit Mercury

March 10, 2011

Dwayne Brown
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1726
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Paulette Campbell
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Md.
240-228-6792
paulette.campbell@jhuapl.edu

MEDIA ADVISORY: M11-052

NASA MEDIA TELECON PREVIEWS FIRST SPACECRAFT TO ORBIT MERCURY

WASHINGTON -- NASA will host a media teleconference at 1 p.m. EDT on
Tuesday, March 15, to discuss the first spacecraft to orbit Mercury.

NASA's MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging,
or MESSENGER, will enter orbit at approximately 9 p.m. EDT on
Thursday, March 17. The spacecraft has conducted more than a dozen
laps through the inner solar system for the past 6.6 years.

Media teleconference participants are:
-- Andy Calloway, MESSENGER mission operations manager, Johns Hopkins
University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Md.
-- Carl Engelbrecht, MESSENGER propulsion subsystem lead, APL
-- Sean Solomon, MESSENGER principal investigator, Carnegie
Institution of Washington

To participate and to receive dial-in instructions, reporters must
contact Steve Cole at stephen.e.cole@nasa.gov or 202-358-0918.

During the briefing, related images will be available at:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/messenger/media/MOITelecon.html

Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live on NASA's website
at:

http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio

At 10 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, March 16, NASA experts will hold a
one-hour, live Web chat to answer questions about MESSENGER's orbital
insertion. The chat window will open at 9:30 a.m. To participate,
visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/connect/chat/messenger_chat.html

For more information about the mission, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/messenger

-end-

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