NASA’s Perseverance rover has ended end of its seven-month journey from Earth.
The six-wheeled robot in a deep crater near the planet’s equator called Jezero.
Engineers at NASA’s mission control in California erupted with joy when confirmation of touchdown came through.
The robot will now spend at least the next two years drilling into the local rocks, looking for evidence of past life.
Jezero is thought to have held a giant lake billions of years ago. And where there’s been water, there’s the possibility there might also have been life.
It’s got to put itself down safely on the Red Planet – a task that has befuddled so many spacecraft before it.
If Perseverance is successful, it has an amazing opportunity to find signs of past life on Mars.
Never has a science mission gone to the planet with so sophisticated a suite of instruments; never has a robot been targeted at so promising a location.
Jezero Crater bears all the hallmarks in satellite imagery of once having held a giant lake. And where there’s been abundant water, perhaps there’s been biology as well.
Perseverance will sift and drill into the sediments to look for traces of ancient microbial activity. The most propitious examples will be packaged for return to Earth by later missions.
Matt Wallace, NASA’s deputy project manager for Perseverance, said: “But before we can get that surface mission going, we have to land on Mars and that is always a challenging feat.
“This is one of the most difficult maneuvers we do in the space business. Almost 50% of the spacecraft sent to the surface of Mars have failed, so we know we have our work cut out to get down safely at Jezero.”
The signal alerting controllers that Perseverance was down and safe arrived at 20:55 GMT. In the past they might have hugged and high-fived but strict coronavirus protocols meant they had all been separated by perspex screens. A respectful fist bump was about all they could manage. The robot’s protective capsule will do most of the work of scrubbing off the entry speed but a supersonic parachute and a rocket jetpack, or “Sky crane”, will be needed for the last three minutes of braking and surface placement.
Of the 14 landing attempts at the planet, eight have been successful – all of them American. Indeed, NASA has only got it wrong once, way back in 1999.
Engineers will be following proceedings at mission control at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
Telemetry from the rover during its descent will be relayed by an overflying satellite – the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The team will also be listening to a series of low-data tones coming back direct from the robot itself.
ESA’s Schiaparelli mission did not behave as expected as it headed down to the surface of Mars on October 19.
According to telemetry data recovered from the probe during its descent, Schiaparelli’s parachute was jettisoned too early.
The rockets it was supposed to use to bring itself to a standstill just above the ground also appeared to fire for too short a time.
The ESA has not yet conceded that the lander crashed but the mood is not positive.
Experts will continue to analyze the data and they may also try to call out to Schiaparelli in the blind hope that it is actually sitting on the Red Planet intact.
In addition, the Americans will use one of their satellites at Mars to image the targeted landing zone to see if they can detect any hardware. Although, the chances are slim because the probe is small.
For the moment, all ESA has to work with is the relatively large volume of engineering data Schiaparelli managed to transmit back to the “mothership” that dropped it off at Mars – the Trace Gas Orbiter.
This shows that everything was fine as the probe entered the atmosphere.
Schiaparelli’s heatshield appeared to do the job of slowing the craft, and the parachute opened as expected to further decelerate the robot.
But it is at the end of the parachute phase that the data indicates unusual behavior.
NASA has ended a Mars simulation in Hawaii, where a team of six people lived in near isolation for a year.
Since August 2015, the group lived in close quarters in a dome, without fresh air, fresh food or privacy.
Experts estimate that a human mission to Mars could take between one and three years.
The NASA-funded study run by the University of Hawaii is the longest of its kind since a Russian mission that lasted 520 days.
Having survived their year in isolation, the crew members said they were confident a mission to the Red Planet could succeed.
Cyprien Verseux, a crew member from France, told journalists: “I can give you my personal impression which is that a mission to Mars in the close future is realistic.
“I think the technological and psychological obstacles can be overcome.”
Mission commander Carmel Johnston said the lack of privacy over the past year had been difficult: “It is kind of like having roommates that just are always there and you can never escape them so I’m sure some people can imagine what that is like and if you can’t then just imagine never being able to get away from anybody.”
Tristan Bassingthwaighte, a doctor of architecture at the University of Hawaii, praised research done into the human element of space travel: “The research going on up here is just super vital when it comes to picking crews, figuring out how people are going to actually work on different kinds of missions, and sort of the human factors element of space travel, colonization, whatever it is you are actually looking at.”
The team consisted of a French astro-biologist, a German physicist and four Americans – a pilot, an architect, a journalist and a soil scientist.
The NASA experiment dealt with the human element of exploration.
Whilst conducting research, the six had to live with limited resources, wear a space-suit when outside the dome, and work to avoid personal conflicts.
They each had a small sleeping cot and a desk inside their rooms. Provisions included powdered cheese and canned tuna.
Missions to the International Space Station (ISS) normally only last six months.
SpaceX’s Elon Musk has announced he is planning to send his Dragon spacecraft to Mars by 2018.
The billionaire has long targeted a trip to Mars and has previously said he can get humans to the red planet by 2026.
SpaceX is planning “Red Dragon” missions to Mars to test technology for bigger missions.
In a tweet, Elon Musk said that its Dragon 2 spacecraft is “designed to be able to land anywhere in the solar system”.
Photo PANews
However, Elon Musk “wouldn’t recommend transporting astronauts beyond Earth-moon region” as the internal area of the spacecraft is only the size of a large car.
“Wouldn’t be fun for longer journeys,” he said in a tweet.
SpaceX has been developing rockets and has a $1.6 billion contract with NASA to supply the International Space Station (ISS).
On April 27, the company won an $83 million contract from the US Air Force to launch a satellite for GPS navigation services.
It is a significant win for SpaceX as, for the last decade, Lockheed Martin and Boeing have been supplying space launches for the military.
In December 2015, SpaceX had another breakthrough, landing its Falcon-9 unmanned rocket upright.
That was an important development in its plan to cut the cost of space launches by re-using rockets.
India has successfully put the Mangalyaan robotic probe into orbit around Mars, becoming the fourth country to do so.
The Mangalyaan robotic probe, one of the cheapest interplanetary missions ever, will soon begin work studying the Red Planet’s atmosphere.
A 24-minute engine burn slowed the probe down enough to allow it to be captured by Mars’ gravity.
Indian PM Narendra Modi said the country had achieved the “near impossible”.
Speaking at the mission control centre in the southern city of Bangalore Narendra Modi said: “The odds were stacked against us. Of 51 missions attempted in the world only 21 have succeeded. We have prevailed.”
Only the US, Europe and Russia have previously sent missions to Mars, but India is the first country to succeed on its first attempt.
The latest US satellite, Maven, arrived at Mars on September 22.
NASA congratulated its Indian counterpart, the Indian Space and Research Organization (ISRO), on Wednesday’s success.
“We congratulate @ISRO for its Mars arrival! @MarsOrbiter joins the missions studying the Red Planet,” NASA tweeted.
From early in the morning, there was an atmosphere of excitement and tension at the Indian Space Agency’s Mission Tracking Centre in Bangalore.
Mangalyaan was launched from the Sriharikota spaceport on the coast of the Bay of Bengal on November 5, 2013
Scientists, many of them women and several of them young, were seated in front of their computer monitors tracking the progress of Mangalyaan.
Giant screens above their heads fed a steady stream of data, graphics and sequence of operations. The first whoops broke out when Mangalyaan successfully fired up its liquid engine, the first in a series of critical moves to make sure that the spacecraft was able to launch into the planet’s gravitational pull.
Then there was an agonizing 20 minutes, when Mangalyaan disappeared behind Mars and beyond contact.
But there was no mistaking the moment, when the scientists all rose as one, cheered, clapped, hugged each other and exchanged high fives – confirmation that Mangalyaan was now on an elliptical orbit around Mars.
After PM Narendra Modi’s congratulations, they poured out into the open and the bright sunlight, beaming as they took in the adulation.
Narendra Modi congratulated the scientists and said: “Today all of India should celebrate our scientists. Schools, colleges should applaud this.”
“If our cricket team wins a tournament, the nation celebrates. Our scientists’ achievement is greater,” he said.
The total cost of the Indian mission has been put at 4.5 billion rupees ($74 million), which makes it one of the cheapest interplanetary space missions ever.
NASA’s recent Maven mission cost $671 million.
The Mangalyaan probe will now set about taking pictures of Mars and studying its atmosphere.
One key goal is to try to detect methane in the Martian air, which could be an indicator of biological activity at, or more likely just below, the surface.
NASA has put four robot rovers on Mars since 1997 – the latest and biggest of them all, the one-tonne vehicle known as Curiosity, landed on the Red Planet in August 2012. Unlike Curiosity, the Indian probe will not land on Mars.
Mangalyaan – more formally referred to as Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) – was launched from the Sriharikota spaceport on the coast of the Bay of Bengal on November 5, 2013.
[youtube VZL_Vwy0JqI 650]
This website has updated its privacy policy in compliance with EU GDPR 2016/679. Please read this to review the updates about which personal data we collect on our site. By continuing to use this site, you are agreeing to our updated policy. AcceptRejectRead More
Privacy & Cookies Policy
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
