“Landing confirmed,” Operations Leader Swati Mohan said around 3:55 pm ET (2055 GMT) when mission control at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory headquarters erupted into cheers.
The autonomously guided procedure was completed more than 11 minutes earlier, which is the time it takes for radio signals to return to Earth.
“WOOF!!” tweeted NASA Associate Administrator Thomas Zurburchen as he posted the first black and white image of Perseverance from the Jezero crater in the northern hemisphere of Mars.
The rover is only the fifth to put its wheels on Mars. The feat was first accomplished in 1997 and so far they have all been Americans.
Roughly the size of an SUV, it weighs a ton, is equipped with a seven-foot (two-meter) long robotic arm, has 19 cameras, two microphones, and a state-of-the-art instrument suite to aid you in your science goals.
Touchdown confirmed. The #CountdownToMars is complete, but the mission is just beginning. https://t.co/UvOyXQhhN9
– NASA (@NASA) 1613681975000
Perseverance is now embarking on a multi-year mission to search for the biological signatures of microbes that could have existed there billions of years ago, when conditions were warmer and more humid than they are today.
Starting in the summer, it will attempt to collect 30 rock and soil samples in sealed tubes, then send them back to Earth sometime in the 2030s for laboratory analysis.
“The question of whether there is life beyond Earth is one of the most fundamental and essential questions we can ask,” said NASA geologist Katie Stack Morgan.
“Our ability to ask this question and develop the scientific research and technology to answer it is one of the things that makes us as a species so unique.”
NASA also wants to conduct several flashy experiments, including attempting the first powered flight on another planet, with a drone helicopter called Ingenuity that will have to achieve lift in an atmosphere that is one percent the density of Earth.
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