QUESTION:
How come it takes so long to receive information back from Mars?

ANSWER from Cheick on December 20,1996;
It takes long because Mars is far from Earth. The signals sent travel at
300,000 kilometers per second ( speed of light). Depending on the relative
position of Earth and Mars, the time needed is the one way light time
(seconds) which is the distance (kilometers) divided by 300,000.