Relief and jubilation for Mars team

The project manager, Jim Graf, is celebrating the arrival at Mars of the most capable science probe ever to orbit the red planet.

"I am very relieved," said Graf, who was worked on two Mars missions that failed to reach the red planet before getting his chance to celebrate this one. "It was picture perfect. We could not have scripted it better."

The mission control team is now checking the health and status of the spacecraft and its instruments. Some minimal science can start soon, but much of the real work will have to wait for several months while the spacecraft slowly adjusts it orbit.

JPL director Charles Elachi says, "It feels great to imagine we have a third American spacecraft in orbit around Mars. We now really have a permanent presence there now. ... It's really a long-term program to understand another world."