Tag: insight lander

Get ready for Perseverance’s landing on Mars February 18

Some call attempts to land on Mars “7 minutes of terror.” The Perseverance mission will provide the most detailed video and photos of a landing yet. We’ll watch ourselves land on another planet, for the first time ever. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/get-ready-nasa-perseverance-landing-feb2021…

NASA “mole’s” attempts to dig into Mars failed. What’s next?

The mission team for NASA’s InSight lander called off its attempts to try to dig deeper into Mars with the heat probe known as “the mole.” Meanwhile, the rest of the mission gained an extension to December 2022. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/nasa-calls-halt-to-attempts-by-insight-mole-to-dig-into-mars…

After 2 Years on Mars, NASA’s Digger Declared Dead

“NASA declared the Mars digger dead Thursday after failing to burrow deep into the red planet to take its temperature,” reports the Associated Press: Scientists in Germany spent two years trying to get their heat probe, dubbed the mole, to drill into the Martian crust. But the 16-inch-long (40-centimeter) device that is part of NASA’s InSight lander couldn’t gain enough friction…

InSight and Juno Keep on Trucking

NASA’s InSight lander on Mars and the Juno orbiter at Jupiter have new leases on life. From a report: The spacecraft are expected to continue gathering data about their respective planetary targets during their newly extended missions, allowing scientists to learn more about seismic activity on Mars and turn their attention to the moons of Jupiter. Juno’s mission has been extended…

Is Mars still volcanically active?

A new study of geologically young lava flows in Elysium Planitia suggests that Mars might still have residual volcanic activity below its surface. The finding could also correlate with seismic activity detected by the InSight lander in the same region and may have implications for possible martian life. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/mars-cerberus-fossae-young-lava-flows-volcanic-activity…

NASA InSight’s ‘Mole’ is out of sight

NASA’s InSight lander continues working to get its “mole”—a 16-inch-long (40-centimeter-long) pile driver and heat probe—deep below the surface of Mars. A camera on InSight’s arm recently took images of the now partially filled-in “mole hole,” showing only the device’s science tether protruding from the ground. Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-10-nasa-insight-mole-sight.html…

Rice researchers use InSight for deep Mars measurements

Using data from NASA’s InSight Lander on Mars, Rice University seismologists have made the first direct measurements of three subsurface boundaries from the crust to the core of the red planet. Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-08-rice-insight-deep-mars.html…

NASA’s InSight flexes its arm while its ‘mole’ hits pause

NASA’s InSight lander has been using its robotic arm to help the heat probe known as the “mole” burrow into Mars. The mission is providing the first look at the Red Planet’s deep interior to reveal details about the formation of Mars and, ultimately, all rocky planets, including Earth. Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-07-nasa-insight-flexes-arm-mole.html…

Mini-marsquakes measured by InSight lander show effects of sun and wind

Compared with our own planet Earth, Mars might seem like a “dead” planet, but even there, the wind blows and the ground moves. On Earth, we study the ambient seismic noise rippling mainly due to ocean activity to peek underground at the structure of the Earth’s interior. Can we do the same on Mars, without an ocean? Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-07-mini-marsquakes-insight-lander-effects-sun.html…