Approach

In just days the first settlers will land on Mars. However, before that comes the aerobreaking. A difficult but necessary maneuver. Their ship, the Ares, couldn’t hold enough fuel to stop itself, so they had to use Mars’s own atmosphere to slow them down. It was highly dangerous - hit the atmosphere at an angle only a few miliseconds of arc lower and burn. Hit it a bit higher, don’t decelerate enough and hurtle to certain death in the outer space.
The Ares shook and trembled violently for a while.
Suddenly, it stopped.
The approach was perfect.
The colonisation may proceed.