A NASA rover headed for a landing on Mars just Thursday in an epic to bring back rocks that could answer whether life exists on the red dwarf planet.
Ground controllers at the space agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, panicked for the tendency to remain steadfast on the surface of Mars, a long-standing death center for incoming spacecraft. It takes an 11/2 minute nail bite for a sign that will confirm success on earth.
The landing of the six-wheeled vehicle marks the third visit to Mars in just one week. Two spacecraft from the United Arab Emirates and China orbited the planet on consecutive days last week.
NASA’s Permivar rover is ready to swim TO on Mars
In this illustration, provided by NASA, the Perseverance Rover takes off from the cruise stage of its spacecraft just minutes before entering space. (Via NASA / JPL-Caltech AP)
All three missions took off in July to take advantage of the close arrangement of Earth and Mars, traveling about 300 million miles in about seven months.
Consecutively, the largest, most advanced rover sent by NASA, became the ninth spacecraft to successfully land on Mars, it was the first U.S. spacecraft to land.
The size of the car, a plutonium-powered rover aimed at NASA’s smallest and toughest target yet: a – – mile strip, on an ancient river delta filled with pits, rocks and a field of rocks.
Scientists believe that if life had ever evolved on Mars, it would have happened 3 billion to 4 billion years ago, when water was still flowing on Earth.
Percy, nicknamed, is designed to drill with his 7-foot (2-meter) hand and collect rock specimens that may hold signs of microscopic life. The plan called for three to four dozen chalk-sized specimens to be sealed in tubes and placed on Mars, which could be retrieved by a French rover and brought home by another rocket ship, with the goal of bringing them back to Earth in early 2031. Will come. .
Scientists hope to answer one of the central questions of theology, philosophy and space research.
“Are we alone in this kind of vast cosmic desert, just flying out of space, or is life more normal? It just comes out whenever conditions are right?” Said Deputy Project Scientist Ken Wilford. “Big, basic questions, and we don’t know the answers yet. So we’re really on the verge of being able to answer these huge questions.”
The Chinese spacecraft includes a small rover that will also ask for proof of life – if it comes down safely from orbit in May or June.
NASA’s component for ‘the world’s most powerful rocket’ is a failure.
The descent has been described by NASA as a “seven-minute terror,” in which flight controllers can only see helplessly. The preprogrammed spacecraft was built to hit the Martian atmosphere at 12,100 miles per hour (19,500 kilometers), then use a parachute to slow it down and use a rocket-propelled platform to bring the rover down the rest of the way to the surface.
Mars has proved to be a treacherous place: in less than three months in 1999, a U.S. spacecraft crashed just as it entered orbit, as engineers merged into metric and English units, and an American lander crashed on Mars after a premature cut of its engine. .
NASA will work with the European Space Agency to bring the rocks home. The cost of a diligent mission alone is about 3 billion.
The only way to confirm – or deny – is to analyze samples of the world’s best labs. Small enough equipment to send to Mars does not have the required accuracy.
Click here for the Fox News app
“The return of the Mars sample project is probably the most challenging thing we’ve ever tried inside NASA,” said Lori Glaze, director of planetary science. And we don’t do any of this alone.
