Viking 1
Viking 1 was the first of two spacecraft (along with "Viking 2") sent to Mars as part of NASA's Viking program. On July 20, 1976, it became the second spacecraft to soft-land on Mars, and the first soft lander to successfully perform its mission. (The first spacecraft to soft-land on Mars was the Soviet Union's Mars 3 on December 2, 1971, which stopped transmitting after 14.5 seconds.) "Viking 1" held the record for the longest Mars surface mission of days (over 6¼ years) or Martian solar days, until that record was broken by "Opportunity" on May 19, 2010.
List of recurring characters on seaQuest DSV
Commander of the space shuttle "Wayfarer", the first manned Earth vehicle to reach Mars and back, Scott Keller had attended the naval academy with Nathan Bridger, with whom they remained competitively friendly. One night, as a favour to Bridger, Scott ate a dozen and a half of Organa Watt's, the woman who ran the women's dorm at the academy, terrible cookies so Bridger could sneak a girl out the back. However, while Keller opted for outer space, Bridger opted for inner space. Bridger and "seaQuest" eventually rescued Scott's "Wayfarer" capsule after an accident during re-entry forced them to splashdown near the Montegnard Confederation.