Simply minutes after NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover nailed its landing on the Pink Planet, the spacecraft despatched again the primary two photos of its new dwelling in Jezero Crater.
After a seven-month trek to Mars, the Perseverance rover accomplished the perilous touchdown process nicknamed “seven minutes of terror” on Thursday (Feb. 18), with the successful landing introduced simply earlier than four p.m. EST (2100 GMT, or 1 p.m. PST on the mission’s headquarters at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. Simply minutes after the excellent news arrived, NASA obtained the rover’s first two photos.
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These pictures have been taken by hazard cameras hooked up to the spacecraft and are black and white photos; they have been additionally taken with covers nonetheless hooked up to the digital camera lenses for his or her safety. Later photos from the rover shall be rather more spectacular.
The primary picture additionally exhibits the comforting shadow of the rover itself solid on the Martian floor. The brand new pictures may also assist mission personnel establish exactly the place within the touchdown zone Perseverance touched down.
However these photos are simply what scientists on the mission needed to see, exhibiting off the rocky floor of Mars’ Jezero Crater. Mission scientists selected the situation as a result of they imagine that when the Pink Planet was nonetheless coated in water, the crater was as soon as a lake, with a river delta depositing sediments on its ground.
Finding out these rocks, the scientists hope, will permit them to raised perceive the planet’s previous habitability and inform the seek for traces of life on Mars.
E-mail Meghan Bartels at mbartels@house.com or comply with her on Twitter @meghanbartels. Observe us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Fb.
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