NASA Perseverance Rover: Exploring Mars

[Pyan]

Title of thread changed to bring it up-to-date.

 

[dask]

Cool, cool, cool!

 

[BigBadBob141]

What is incredible to me is it has its own helicopter, flying in just one percent of our atmospheric pressure, to be honest I didn't think this was possible.
Still come to think of it parachutes are used in its descent so there is that, plus the helicopter is about the size of a drone, so who knows, one day there might be manned ones out there.
Not like the SF book where they used helicopters to explore the Moon!
As it has now landed safely let's hope for some stunning pictures!
P.S. Also the fact that it will leave behind soil samples to be picked up and returned to Earth by a future robot rover is also incredible!!!I
Also I find the so called skycrane method of landing pretty damned incredible as well, well done NASA all around for pulling this off, but that bouncy balloon one must have been fun to design!

 

[Pyan]

Video from the actual landing...

Nasa reveals new video from Mars

 

[.matthew.]

It's clearly faked. You can see the wires

But on a more serious note, there's a 'game' called Rover Mechanic Simulator. It's just released a DLC for the Perseverance.

 

[mosaix]

Stunning videos from the landing sequence...

Nasa releases video of Perseverance rover landing on Mars

Space agency also reveals audio recorded by Perseverance on surface of red planet

www.theguardian.com

Edit: Snap. Just seen post by @pyan

 

[BigBadBob141]

Fantastic, truly amazing footage, the amount of detail is a wonder to behold, thank you mosaix for sharing this with us, I wonder what Giovanni Schaiparelli, H.G. Wells and Percival Lowell would think of this, it would probably blow their minds!

 

[Boneman]

Fantastic, truly amazing footage, the amount of detail is a wonder to behold, thank you mosaix for sharing this with us, I wonder what Giovanni Schaiparelli, H.G. Wells and Percival Lowell would think of this, it would probably blow their minds!

No one would have believed, in the first years of the 21st Century that Martian affairs were being watched from the timeless worlds of space....

 

[mosaix]

'Hidden Message' in Mars rover parachute.

'Dare mighty things': hidden message found on Nasa Mars rover parachute

Social media users say message is encoded in red-and-white pattern on parachute

www.theguardian.com

I thought the markings were so it was possible to tell if the parachute was rotating.

 

[Vertigo]

'Hidden Message' in Mars rover parachute.

'Dare mighty things': hidden message found on Nasa Mars rover parachute

Social media users say message is encoded in red-and-white pattern on parachute

www.theguardian.com

I thought the markings were so it was possible to tell if the parachute was rotating.

The need for asymmetric markings might have originally been for such a purpose but then changing them into a code seems like a simple (and neat) modification.

 

[Brian G Turner]

More updates on new images from Perseverance:

Mars: Nasa's Perseverance rover sends stunning images

Amazing images as Nasa's Perseverance rover lands on Mars and seeks signs of past microbial life.

www.bbc.co.uk

Especially like this image for its clear cliff-face strata:

 

[Ursa major]

Wasn't some of Broadchurch filmed just to the right of that outcrop...?

​

 

[.matthew.]

Breakdown of the landing

 

[Brian G Turner]

And more lovely geology images with sedimentary layers:

Image: Mont Mercou on Mars

Here are a few stunning views of the Curiosity Rover's current location, Mont Mercou in Gale Crater on Mars. This towering outcrop provides a great look at layered sedimentary rock structures. On Earth, it's common to find layered rock like the ones within this cliff face, especially where there...

phys.org

 

[Vertigo]

That one is from Curiosity, of course, I was looking at it just a couple of days ago being curious (see what I did there? ) about how she was doing. Still going strong eight and a half years after landing! Impressive! 25 km travelled even after the worries about the early damage to one of its wheels. It may not seem like very far but it's on Mars!! Mars!!

 

[Robert Zwilling]

Ingenuity, the 4 pound helicopter drone is scheduled to run some test flights starting around April 18, weather permitting. The preparation takes all day and then some, sounds like watching paint dry. It will fly using previously sent instructions. Then it only gets 4 flights, then gets packed away. Sounds like they aren't too keen on trying to land it. Maybe a docking set up would have been safer. Memories of Mr Musk's return landings don't inspire too much confidence in canned landings.
NASA reveals flight zone for historic helicopter flight on Mars

 

[Vertigo]

Ingenuity, the 4 pound helicopter drone is scheduled to run some test flights starting around April 18, weather permitting. The preparation takes all day and then some, sounds like watching paint dry. It will fly using previously sent instructions. Then it only gets 4 flights, then gets packed away. Sounds like they aren't too keen on trying to land it. Maybe a docking set up would have been safer. Memories of Mr Musk's return landings don't inspire too much confidence in canned landings.
NASA reveals flight zone for historic helicopter flight on Mars

I think they are perfectly happy landing it but I don't think it will even get packed away after those four flights. In the words of NASA:

"The first flight is special — it’s by far the most important flight we plan to do,” Grip said, adding that a successful first flight will mean “complete mission success. "

and

"After that, Ingenuity’s test campaign will likely come to an end. It’s a demo mission, and Perseverance has other objectives to focus on..."

My highlighting. As I understand it, it really is just a proof of concept. Getting it to fly at all, completely autonomous remember, is really the sole objective and so proving that it is worth further developing the concept for future missions to any planets with atmosphere (Mars and Venus). It is super lightweight and something so inherently fragile simply surviving the pressures of launch and landing still able to function will be a major success on its own.

 

[Saiyali]

On the night, my son and I watched the NASA webcast while occasionally stepping outside to look at Mars in the sky. It was a very clear night where we live and even though the distance was obviously far too great to see any detail (even with a telescope) somewhere on that orange dot, it was happening right as we looked .. I mean, the light arrived in our eyes probably slightly before NASA's footage got streamed to our computer, so

 

[mosaix]

I think they are perfectly happy landing it but I don't think it will even get packed away after those four flights. In the words of NASA:

"The first flight is special — it’s by far the most important flight we plan to do,” Grip said, adding that a successful first flight will mean “complete mission success. "

and

"After that, Ingenuity’s test campaign will likely come to an end. It’s a demo mission, and Perseverance has other objectives to focus on..."

My highlighting. As I understand it, it really is just a proof of concept. Getting it to fly at all, completely autonomous remember, is really the sole objective and so proving that it is worth further developing the concept for future missions to any planets with atmosphere (Mars and Venus). It is super lightweight and something so inherently fragile simply surviving the pressures of launch and landing still able to function will be a major success on its own.

Also, I would have thought that once it's out on the surface it will be exposed to anything the Martian climate can throw at it, even though the atmosphere is thin.

 

[Vertigo]

Also, I would have thought that once it's out on the surface it will be exposed to anything the Martian climate can throw at it, even though the atmosphere is thin.

Yes, and, though I might be wrong, I don't think the rover has any mechanism to pick it up again. I suspect any such mechanism would have ended up weighing more than Ingenuity itself!