On Monday, NASA gave its latest Mars Rover Perseverance all clear to launch later this week on a mission to look for signs of ancient microbial life.
“The launch readiness review is complete, and we’re actually going to launch it,” said administrator Jim Bridenstine.
“We are in extraordinary times right now with the coronavirus pandemic, and yet we have in fact persevered and protected this mission because it is very important.”
The launch will take place at 7:50 am (1150 GMT) Thursday from Cape Canaveral, Florida, aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.
Live coverage will take place on YouTube and on all social media platforms.
After a seven-month journey, Perseverance will land in Jezero Crater on February 18, 2021.
Approximately the size of an SUV and weighing 2,300 pounds (1,040 kilograms), the six-wheeled robot is NASA’s fifth Mars rover and the most advanced to date.
Perseverance with wit attached below, Kennedy Space Center. (NASA / JPL-Caltech)
It comes equipped with a small helicopter called Ingenio that will try to fly, for the first time on another planet, as well as a robotic arm and a series of cameras and a pair of microphones.
To search for evidence of ancient fossilized bacteria, you’ll use two lasers and an x-ray capable of chemical analysis.
It will also collect rock and soil samples for a future mission that will bring them back to Earth for further study.
This is crucial to establish whether any organic compounds you actually obtained came from living processes.
Perseverance will build on previous orbital and ground missions, which established that the cold, dry Mars we see today was much warmer and wetter billions of years ago.
These environments lasted long enough to possibly support the development of microbial life.
With Thursday’s launch, the United States will become the third nation to embark on a mission to the Red Planet this month.
Artist’s impression of perseverance on Mars. (NASA / JPL-Caltech)
China launched a rover to Mars last week called Tianwen-1 (“Questions to Heaven”).
If China’s mission is successful, it will become the second nation after the United States to have a rover on another planet, although it has previously placed two rovers on the Moon.
The United Arab Emirates also launched an orbital probe from Japan earlier this month called “Al-Amal” (Hope), the first Arab world mission to Mars.
© Agence France-Presse
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