As promised, NASA just released this video of the landing of Perseverance on the surface of Mars, in the north-western part of the Jezero crater. It starts with the deployment of the parachute 11 km above the surface and takes us though the maneuvers of the deployment vehicle and the final sky-crane maneuver to safely deposit Perseverance on the surface of Mars. The overlaid commentary from mission control and the final burst of joy are exhilarating to watch as well.
Fantastic!
This was no ordinary feat — this was the heaviest and most advanced rover to land on Mars. Out of total of 20 21 Mars landing missions, only 8 9 have succeeded, all by NASA. NASA had one failure; all 11 missions by the Russians and Europeans have resulted in failure.
But wait … there’s more! Go to the YouTube link to take a 360 degree look at the grandeur that surrounds Percy; you can pan and tilt in the video.
The Sounds of Mars, heard for the very first time -
From mars.nasa.gov/… -
A microphone attached to the rover did not collect usable data during the descent, but the commercial off-the-shelf device survived the highly dynamic descent to the surface and obtained sounds from Jezero Crater on Feb. 20. About 10 seconds into the 60-second recording, a Martian breeze is audible for a few seconds, as are mechanical sounds of the rover operating on the surface.
In case you are wondering where the parachute, the heat shield and the descent stage, which flew away at the end of the video, (crash-) landed, they all landed about 1 km away from Percy.
Here is the video of the media conference, still in progress.
In case you missed it, here are some images released over the weekend —
This image was taken by the HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter as Perseverance parachuted towards the landing area. The circle below the square is where Percy landed.
An unbelievable image of Perseverance hanging by its cords, captured by a video camera at the bottom of the descent stage, moments before touchdown -
First color image of the view from Perseverance -
Mars rocks!
What next?
There will lot more exciting events in the coming weeks and months as Perseverance checks out its instruments, tests the Mars helicopter and then goes looking for ancient life in the river-delta inside the Jazero crater.
From mars.nasa.gov/… - Several pyrotechnic charges are expected to fire later on Friday, releasing Perseverance’s mast (the “head” of the rover) from where it is fixed on the rover’s deck. The Navigation Cameras (Navcams), which are used for driving, share space on the mast with two science cameras: the zoomable Mastcam-Z and a laser instrument called SuperCam. The mast is scheduled to be raised Saturday, Feb. 20, after which the Navcams are expected to take panoramas of the rover’s deck and its surroundings.
In the days to come, engineers will pore over the rover’s system data, updating its software and beginning to test its various instruments. In the following weeks, Perseverance will test its robotic arm and take its first, short drive. It will be at least one or two months until Perseverance will find a flat location to drop off Ingenuity, the mini-helicopter attached to the rover’s belly, and even longer before it finally hits the road.
On its journey in the next two years, Perseverance will explore the river delta area in Jezero crater, then climb the crater wall to its west, analyze rock and regolith samples for signs of ancient microbial life, cache a few samples for pickup by a future mission, and test an oxygen generator prototype.
The Search for Life
Percy’s prime objective is astrobiology and the search for past microbial life on Mars. The landing and exploration site in Jezero (meaning lake) crater was chosen because of the possibility of finding signs of ancient life there. Based on analysis of the topology of the area and surface composition, scientists believe that the crater contained a lake 3.5 billion years ago. Two rivers channeled water into it and deposited sediments into fan-shaped deltas. The sediments have been observed to be rich in clays, which only form in the presence of water. On Earth, scientists have found such clays in the Mississippi river delta, where microbial life has been found embedded in the rock itself.
Go Perseverance!
If you have any questions about the mission, ask away — there are plenty of experts here who will gladly answer them.
Further Reading
- NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover Provides Front-Row Seat to Landing, First Audio Recording of Red Planet — mars.nasa.gov/…
- Mars 2020 Mission website — mars.nasa.gov/…
- A Celebration of the first day of Perseverance on Mars — www.dailykos.com/…
- The Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover and the Search for Life — www.dailykos.com/…
- Raw images from the mission (including 733 new ones) — mars.nasa.gov/...