
NASA's latest Mars craft lands for unprecedented seismic mission
>> Reuters
Published: 27 Nov 2018 02:34 AM BdST Updated: 27 Nov 2018 02:34 AM BdST
-
A life-size model of the spaceship Insight, NASA's first robotic lander dedicated to studying the deep interior of Mars, is shown at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, US November 26, 2018. Reuters
-
The mission control team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) react on a video screen as the spaceship Insight, NASA's first robotic lander dedicated to studying the deep interior of Mars, sends its first picture back to JPL, in Pasadena, California, US November 26, 2018. Reuters
-
The first picture sent back to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) from the spaceship Insight is shown on a video screen at JPL in Pasadena, California, U.S. November 26, 2018. Reuters
NASA's Mars lander InSight touched down safely on the surface of the Red Planet on Monday to begin its two-year mission as the first spacecraft designed to explore the deep interior of another world.
Engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) near Los Angeles said the successful landing was confirmed by signals relayed to Earth from one of two miniature satellites that were launched along with InSight and flying past Mars when it arrived shortly before 3 p.m. EST (2000 GMT)
Members of the mission control team burst into applause and cheered in relief as they received data showing that the spacecraft had survived its perilous descent to the Martian surface.

The mission control team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) react on a video screen as the spaceship Insight, NASA's first robotic lander dedicated to studying the deep interior of Mars, sends its first picture back to JPL, in Pasadena, California, US November 26, 2018. Reuters
Carrying instruments that detect planetary heat and seismic rumblings never measured anywhere else but Earth, the stationary lander streaked into the thin Martian atmosphere at 12,300 miles (19,795 km) per hour.
Its 77-mile descent was then slowed by atmospheric friction, a giant parachute and retro rockets, bringing the three-legged spacecraft to a gentle landing 6 1/2 minutes later. InSight came to rest as planned in the middle of a vast, barren plain called the Elysium Planitia, close to the planet's equator.
InSight will spend 24 months - about one Martian year - taking seismic and temperature readings to unlock mysteries about how Mars formed and, by extension, the origins of the Earth and other rocky planets of the inner solar system.

The first picture sent back to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) from the spaceship Insight is shown on a video screen at JPL in Pasadena, California, U.S. November 26, 2018. Reuters
Minutes after the landing, JPL controllers received a fuzzy photograph of the probe's new surroundings on Martian soil.
The 880-pound (360 kg) InSight - its name is short for Interior Exploration Using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport - marks the 21st US-launched Mars mission, dating back to the Mariner fly-bys of the 1960s. Nearly two dozen other Mars missions have been sent from other nations.
More stories
WARNING:
Any unauthorised use or reproduction of bdnews24.com content for commercial purposes is strictly prohibited and constitutes copyright infringement liable to legal action.
- NASA bids adieu to Opportunity, the Mars rover that kept going and going
- This North Pole is on the move
- What happened to Earth’s ancient craters? Scientists seek clues on the moon’s pocked surface
- BCSIR launches new genome sequencing lab
- Michael Atiyah, mathematician in Newton’s footsteps, dies at 89
- The odd creatures beneath our feet
- China 'lifts mysterious veil' by landing probe on far side of the moon
- NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft signals successful flyby of Ultima Thule
- New Horizons approaches the most distant object ever visited: ‘We only get one shot’
- Trilobites - It’s the solar system’s most distant object. Astronomers named it Farout
Most Read
- Five die as bus rams truck in Cumilla
- Rohingyas beat up three German journalists at Bangladesh refugee camp
- Chawkbazar was ‘already hell on earth’: How the inferno started and spread fast
- Gas cylinders became 'as lethal as bombs' during Old Dhaka fire
- Two doctors among victims killed in Old Dhaka fire
- Family of Old Dhaka fire victim files case for ‘death caused by negligence’
- Russia, US, UK, India condole Chawkbazar fire victims
- 'Dream of a safe place': Saudi sisters in hiding in Hong Kong after fleeing family
- Tragedy strikes Old Dhaka again as chemical factories not moved away
- Bodies of 46 Chawkbazar fire victims handed over to families