High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Viking 1 was the first of two spacecraft (along with Viking 2) sent to Mars as part of NASA`s Viking program. It was the first spacecraft to successfully land on Mars and perform its mission, and held the record for the longest Mars surface mission of 6 years and 116 days or 1775 sols (from landing until surface mission termination, Earth time) until that record was broken by the Opportunity Rover on May 19, 2010.