Submitted via IRC for Bytram
Watch closely as NASA deploys the world's biggest parachute at supersonic speeds
NASA engineers have launched a gigantic parachute as big as a size of a house[sic] at record speed to prepare for its Mars 2020 mission.
The object, dubbed ASPIRE (Advanced Supersonic Parachute Inflation Research Experiments), unfolded from a small cylinder to a massive parachute, weighing over 80 kilograms (180 pounds), in just four-tenths of a second.
ASPIRE was tested earlier this year in September. NASA hopes that it can be used to slow down a spacecraft carrying the Mars 2020 rover so that the vehicle can slow in the upper atmosphere. The parachute will then detach and the spacecraft will fire up rockets, hover over the surface and then lower the rover to the surface of the Red Planet.
[...] The parachute was carried aboard a Black Brant IX sounding rocket travelling at nearly twice the speed of sound (343 meters per second). After two minutes, the rocket reached the appropriate altitude of 38 kilometers - where the atmosphere of Earth thins and mimics the one on Mars - and released the parachute.
[...] In one swift expansion, it created a drag force of a whopping 311,375 Newtons (70,000 pounds of force). ASPIRE's canopy stretches over 20 meters in diameter and is made out of nylon and Kevlar. It's held together by over three million stitches and carried by threads of Technora, a strong synthetic fibre.
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Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984
Mars InSight Lander on Course for Monday Touchdown
After a six-month voyage from Earth, NASA’s InSight Mars lander, streaking through space at at some 12,300 mph, will slam into the thin martian atmosphere Monday afternoon to begin a nail-biting six-and-a-half-minute descent to the surface, kicking off a billion-dollar mission to probe the red planet’s hidden interior.
“The goal of InSight is nothing less than to better understand the birth of the Earth, the birth of the planet we live on, and we’re going to do that by going to Mars,” said Principle Investigator Bruce Banerdt.
On Earth, plate tectonics and the constantly churning mantle have altered the planet’s deep interior, obscuring its history and evolution. But Mars is a smaller planet and much less active than Earth, retaining the “fingerprints” of those earlier processes.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Sulla on Tuesday October 30 2018, @07:28PM (2 children)
If the mission gets pushed back at all we might see a BFR land on Mars before the parachute is used
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday October 30 2018, @08:49PM (1 child)
Mars 2020 [wikipedia.org] is based on proven technologies from the Curiosity mission, such as the infamous "rocket crane", but it has different science instruments.
The 2020 launch window [wikipedia.org] enables spacecraft to get to Mars quicker and cheaper. ExoMars rover, Mars Hope, a "2020 Chinese Mars Mission", and the Mars Orbiter Mission 2 are also planned for launch between July 2020 and September 2020.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday October 30 2018, @09:00PM
> Mars 2020 [wikipedia.org] is based on proven technologies from the Curiosity mission,
> such as the infamous "rocket crane", but it has different science instruments.
Good for science, bad for getting the public excited about funding more science.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Snow on Tuesday October 30 2018, @07:38PM (1 child)
Just want to say thanks for not only supplying a direct youtube link, but also having it set to the exact time the parachute deploys.
(Score: 2) by EETech1 on Wednesday October 31 2018, @03:16AM
My thoughts exactly!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 31 2018, @01:20PM
really amazing! let's hope with "artificial 50 tons" pulling thru the upper atmosphere of mars it won't kick up a dust storm.
after all mars is a pretty much pristine environment and everything had "millions of years" to settle into a "cycle".
on earth all the "edges" of pretty much everything have been filled off and it's hard to find so-called "tiny stones that will unleash a avalanche" scenarios.
i reckon, mars is full of them?
anyways, for me personally the most amazing tech feet remains the inflated shell around the bouncing rover : )