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The Mars 2020 rover will touch down on the red planet in February 2021 in the 45 Kilometer wide Jezero Crater. But if you want, it can take a little piece of you with it, your name.
NASA is inviting people around the world to submit their names to fly aboard the life-hunting Mars 2020 rover, which is scheduled to launch next summer and touch down on the Red Planet in February 2021.
Its quick, its easy, and its free.
Getting your name (way) out there is easy; just fill out the short form here by Sept. 30. You'll get a Mars "boarding pass" for your minimal trouble.
This isn't a new idea for NASA, they did the same thing on the Mars Insight Lander, which landed in November of last year with more than two million people's names onboard.
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) mission team members in Pasadena, California will
use an electron beam to etch submitted names onto a microchip, in lines of text that are less than 0.1% as wide as a human hair. About 1 million names can be squeezed onto a single chip, NASA officials said.
And, on the subject of names, the rover will be getting a new one soon enough.
NASA plans to hold a student naming competition, as the agency has done with Red Planet rovers in the past. For example, then-sixth-grader Clara Ma submitted the moniker "Curiosity" for Mars 2020's predecessor, which has been exploring the Red Planet's Gale Crater since 2012.
If you are keeping track, 313,586,649 frequent flyer miles (504,668,791 km) award points will be awarded on the flight from Cape Canaveral to Jezero Crater.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 23 2019, @06:06AM (6 children)
If the new Mars rover name will be selected based on the most votes in an online poll then you can look forward to something like “Hitler did nothing wrong,” “Diabeetus,” or “Gushing Granny.” [time.com]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 23 2019, @08:20AM (2 children)
I vote we name it after the Roman Goddess of love.
Just to confuse and annoy everyone.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 23 2019, @08:27AM
1000 · ^
(Score: 2) by Bot on Thursday May 23 2019, @12:38PM
Venus ab Veneris facie is OK with me.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by Rupert Pupnick on Thursday May 23 2019, @12:45PM
I can see it now in glistening polished titanium letters: RUPERT PUPNICK
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Thursday May 23 2019, @02:17PM
And that's just a rover. I really feel bad about the student they are going to rename!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 23 2019, @03:31PM
That method seems to work out just fine as long as incels aren't allowed to participate.