Landing on Mars is hard. So you’ll want to see tomorrow when Perseverance (formerly called Mars 2020) becomes the first artificial object to land on the red planet since the Insight Mars launcher in 2018. It will be the first rover since Curiosity touched in 2012. Due to the his landing at Jezero Crater, just north of the equator of Mars, Perseverance carries a wealth of scientific instruments to collect soil samples and look for signs of ancient life. It is equipped with advanced audiovisual technology that allows us to see and hear, for the first time, what it is like to touch another world. It will be exciting! Live coverage of the NASA TV event will begin tomorrow, February 18, at 2:15 pm EST (19:15 UTC); the landing will take place at approximately 15:55 pm EST (20:55 UTC).
Where to watch: NASA TV, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitch, Daily Motion and THETA.TV.
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Perseverance’s innovative cameras and microphones will capture much of its fundamental entry, descent, and landing process. This process, sometimes called by space engineers seven minutes of terror, is considered by many to be the most critical and dangerous part of the mission.
According to NASA, engineers expect to receive notice of key milestones to land at the estimated times below. Due to the distance that Mars signals must travel to Earth, these events occur on Mars 11 minutes, 22 seconds earlier than indicated below. In addition, a variety of factors can affect the precise timing of these milestones listed above, including the properties of the Martian atmosphere that are difficult to predict until the spacecraft actually traverses.
– Separation of the cruise stage: the part of the spacecraft that has been flying Perseverance -with NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter connected to its belly- through space for the last 6 and a half months will be separated from the entrance capsule around 15:38 EST 12:38 pm PST, 20:38 UTC).
– Atmospheric entry: The spacecraft is expected to reach the top of the Martian atmosphere traveling at approximately 19,500 km / h at 15:48 EST (12:48 PST, 20:48 UTC).
– Maximum warming peak: Atmospheric friction will heat the bottom of the spacecraft to temperatures of up to about 2,370 degrees Fahrenheit (about 1,300 degrees Celsius) at 3:49 pm EST (12:49 pm PST, 20:49 UTC).
– Parachute Deployment: The spacecraft will deploy its parachute at supersonic speed around 3:52 pm EST (12:52 pm PST, 20:52 UTC). The exact deployment time is based on the new Range Trigger technology, which improves the accuracy of the spacecraft’s ability to achieve a landing target.
Separation of the heat shield: the protective lower part of the inlet capsule will come off about 20 seconds after the deployment of the parachute. This allows the rover to use radar to determine how far from the ground it is and use its ground-based navigation technology to find a safe landing site.
– Separation of the rear housing: the rear half of the entry capsule attached to the parachute will be separated from the rover and its “jetpack” (known as the descent stage) at 15:54 EST (12:54 pm PST, 20:54 UTC). The jetpack will use retrorockets to slow down and fly to the landing site.
– Touchdown: the descent stage of the spacecraft, by maneuvering the sky crane, will lower the rover to the surface with nylon ties. The rover is expected to touch the surface of Mars at human speed (approximately 1.7 mph, or 2.7 km / h) around 3:55 pm EST (12:55 pm PST, 20:55 UTC ).
The shell containing NASA’s Perseverance rover is guided toward the Martian surface as it descends through the atmosphere in this illustration. Hundreds of critical events must run perfectly and just in time for the rover to land on Mars safely. Image via NASA / JPL-Caltech.
The rover will reach the Martian atmosphere traveling at 19,000 km / h (almost 12,000 miles per hour), crossing the sky as its protective thermal shield helps to slow it down. Then, at a height of 1.5 km, the descent module will fire its engines, while a new relative terrain navigation system will be started to identify a safe landing point. Basically, it will scan and analyze the terrain below, then relate it to the maps in your database and prepare for the touchdown.
A 21-foot-diameter parachute will be deployed to further slow the boat, causing its descent to extend before the sky crane begins its task of lowering the rover to the ground. The Sky Crane is the same planning and landing system used by Curiosity and is a fully autonomous system designed to give rovers a smooth, smooth (hopeful) landing.
By design, the rover is very similar to the Curiosity rover, currently in the Gale Crater, but has a few different scientific instruments. While Curiosity focuses on finding evidence of past habitability, which it has done, perseverance seeks direct evidence of life itself. This will be the first mission since the end of the coming Viking 1 and 2 in the late seventies and early eighties.
Perseverance’s new, eye-catching cameras will capture much of this whole process. A camera mounted on the back shell of the spacecraft is pointed upwards. This will record a view of the parachute unfolding as it delays landing. Below is a camera pointing down at the descent stage, which will film its first tactile contact with Earth on Mars. This set of technology will provide us with the most detailed video and photo records of the landing in a neighboring world to date. Lori Glaze, who heads the Planetary Sciences Division of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, told reporters:
We will be able to see ourselves landing on another planet for the first time.
However, there will be no live streaming of the images, as we are accustomed to with the events of the International Space Station and rocket launches from Earth. The reason for this is due to a delay in the data relay from Mars to Earth, which is slower than even the old telephone connection connections. But we may experience Perseverance on Earth through the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which can share low-resolution images with us shortly after landing. In addition, we will also have live food from mission control at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Images from the Curiosity landing have left us with some iconic images (integer Bobak Ferdowsi). Of course, coronavirus protocols will remain in place in mission control, but even a pandemic is unlikely to dampen the celebration. Assistant Perseverance Project Manager Matt Wallace said:
I don’t think Covid is able to stop us from jumping up and down and not going up. You will see a lot of people happy, no matter what happens, once we come to the surface safely.
Investigators of the main control of the NASA-JPL mission, celebrating the landing of Curiosity in 2012. Image via NASA / Daily Mail.
So far, there have only been eight successful landings from Mars: Viking 1 and Viking 2 (both 1976), Pathfinder (1997), Spirit and Opportunity (both 2004), Phoenix (2008), Curiosity (2012) and InSight (2018).
The Soviet Union is the only other country to have successfully landed a spacecraft on Mars. It was 1971 and 1973.
On the other hand, once they get there, Mars missions can last for years and Earth robots have spent years rolling around Mars. With the Perseverance mission, for the first time, NASA will try something new; he will drop a small helicopter into the Martian air. The helicopter is called Ingenuity. He will try to explore the small planet, trying to target places of interest for future missions to Mars.
NASA chose the Jezero crater as the landing site for the Perseverance rover with good reason. Scientists believe the area was flooded and housed an ancient water river delta more than 3.5 billion years ago. The river channels spilled over the crater wall and created a lake, which carried clay minerals from its surroundings. Microbial life could have lived in the crater during one or more of these wet periods, and if so, signs of its remains could be found in the sediments of the lake or shoreline. Scientists will study how the region formed and evolved, look for signs of past life, and collect samples of rock and Mars soil that can preserve these signs. The landing site selection process involved mission team members and scientists from around the world, who carefully examined more than 60 candidate sites. But after a thorough five-year study of potential sites, each with its own characteristics and appeal, Jezero climbed to the top.
In preparation for the Perseverance landing, NASA offers landing resources, ways to participate, social opportunities, and more. Download posters, stickers, fact sheets, mission patches and more. Sign up for a virtual landing event, where you can connect online with other space enthusiasts and ask NASA experts your most burning questions. Get lessons and activities for students, or even stamps for virtual passports, all available through their website here.
NASA will use a “sky crane” to gently lower perseverance to the surface of Mars. Concept of artist through NASA.
Summary: Due to arriving at Jezero Crater tomorrow, NASA’s Perseverance rover will bring scientific instruments to collect soil samples and look for signs of ancient life. He will also use audiovisual technology to make us see and hear what it’s like to play for the first time in another world. How to see live coverage of the Perseverance landing.
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