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The latest photograph, taken of a deployable module suspended above the surface with six rocket engines running, is the first image of its kind received by NASA.
The deployable module, which transported the Martian from Earth, reduced the landing speed to approximately 2.7 km per hour during the final landing phase and acted as a “flying crane”.
“You can see the dust from the machine’s engines,” said Adam Steltzner, chief engineer for the Perseverance project. He added that the photo was taken when the camera was about two feet high.
The three straight ropes seen in the photo formed a suspension that held the Martian hanging below the deployable module. There is also a coiled cable to transfer data from camcorders to Perseverance.
As soon as the Martian touched the surface, it was released from the 6.4 m long ropes, and the deployable module flew to the ground and landed safely.
Another newly released photo of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows a deployable perseverance carrier module that deploys a special parachute and travels through the atmosphere at speeds of hundreds of kilometers per hour.
Perseverance itself also sent the first high-resolution color photo of a flat area at the lake’s crater landing site, where a river flowed and a deep lake flowed billions of years ago.
AFP / Scanpix Photo / Sound Surface
The second color photo shows one of the Martian’s six wheels, as well as the surrounding rocks that are believed to have formed more than 3.6 billion years ago. years.
Scanpix Photo / One of the six wheels of a Martian on the surface of Mars
“One of the questions we’ll ask first is whether this rock is volcanic or sedimentary in origin,” said Katie Stack Morgan, NASA’s deputy scientific director for the project.
The age of the volcanic rocks could be accurately determined when the samples collected by Perseverance are transported to Earth during the next future mission. That would be a major achievement for planetologists.
When the first photos were taken, “everything inspired everyone: the team went crazy,” said Pauline Hwang, chief systems engineer for the mission.
“The team of scientists immediately started looking at all those stones, zoomed in and asked, ‘What is this?’ It couldn’t be better, “he added.
The first two photos, released Thursday shortly after the Martian landing, were lower resolution and in black and white.
NASA expects to receive more high-resolution photos and videos in the coming days, but it is not yet clear whether Martian microphones have been able to record the sounds of Mars.
That may become clear later this weekend or early next week, Steltzner said.
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