Touchdown! NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover Safely Lands on Red Planet:
First image from surface. (Members of NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover team watch in mission control as the first images arrive moments after the spacecraft successfully touched down on Mars, Thursday, Feb. 18, 2021, at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. (Credits: NASA/Bill Ingalls)
The largest, most advanced rover NASA has sent to another world touched down on Mars Thursday, after a 203-day journey traversing 293 million miles (472 million kilometers). Confirmation of the successful touchdown was announced in mission control at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California at 3:55 p.m. EST (12:55 p.m. PST).
Packed with groundbreaking technology, the Mars 2020 mission launched July 30, 2020, from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The Perseverance rover mission marks an ambitious first step in the effort to collect Mars samples and return them to Earth.
“This landing is one of those pivotal moments for NASA, the United States, and space exploration globally – when we know we are on the cusp of discovery and sharpening our pencils, so to speak, to rewrite the textbooks,” said acting NASA Administrator Steve Jurczyk. “The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission embodies our nation’s spirit of persevering even in the most challenging of situations, inspiring, and advancing science and exploration. The mission itself personifies the human ideal of persevering toward the future and will help us prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet in the 2030s.”
About the size of a car, the 2,263-pound (1,026-kilogram) robotic geologist and astrobiologist will undergo several weeks of testing before it begins its two-year science investigation of Mars’ Jezero Crater. While the rover will investigate the rock and sediment of Jezero’s ancient lakebed and river delta to characterize the region’s geology and past climate, a fundamental part of its mission is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. To that end, the Mars Sample Return campaign, being planned by NASA and ESA (European Space Agency), will allow scientists on Earth to study samples collected by Perseverance to search for definitive signs of past life using instruments too large and complex to send to the Red Planet.
Image Gallery: Perseverance Rover.
(Score: 2) by RedGreen on Thursday February 18 2021, @10:20PM (4 children)
I am finally on Mars or my name is anyways from the details of my boarding pass I got from NASA. I wonder how many billions of years it will be there..
"I modded down, down, down, and the flames went higher." -- Sven Olsen
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday February 18 2021, @11:35PM (2 children)
For you to be on Mars, I'd think the robot would have to be made of duct tape.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Hartree on Friday February 19 2021, @04:11AM
"If the Martians don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy."
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday February 19 2021, @06:18PM
Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side. It has a dark side. And it binds the universe together.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 19 2021, @01:33AM
You'd do much better to have been in orbit. I don't think you'll last long there with those abrasive sand storms, unless maybe it finds a cave to retire into at the end of mission.