Astronomy Picture of the Day - Perseverance: Seven Minutes to Mars

APOD.NASA.gov ^ | 16 Feb, 2021 | Video Credit: NASA, JPL

[MtnClimber]

Explanation: How hard is it to land safely on Mars? So hard that many more attempts have failed than succeeded. The next attempt will be on Thursday. The main problem is that the Martian atmosphere is too thick to ignore -- or it will melt your spacecraft. On the other hand, the atmosphere is too thin to rely on parachutes -- or your spacecraft will crash land. Therefore, as outlined in the featured video, the Perseverance lander will lose much of its high speed by deploying a huge parachute, but then switch to rockets, and finally, assuming everything goes right, culminate with a hovering Sky Crane that will slowly lower the car-sized Perseverance rover to the surface with ropes. It may sound crazy, but the Curiosity rover was placed on Mars using a similar method in 2012. From atmospheric entry to surface touch-down takes about seven minutes, all coordinated by an onboard computer because Mars is too far away for rapid interactive communication. During this time, humans on Earth will simply wait to hear if the landing was successful. Last week, UAE's Hope spacecraft successfully began orbiting Mars, followed a day later by the Chinese Tianwen-1 mission, which will likely schedule a landing of its own rover sometime in the next few months.

[Paul R.]

Interesting that UAE’s spacecraft “Hope” and the Chinese “Tianwen-1” also made it successfully to Mars orbits - no small task in itself. I believe only the ESA has also managed to successfully place a craft in orbit around Mars on the 1st try.

Granted the UAE depended and depends mostly on US and Japanese expertise. But it is a great success so far for that team.

[Paul R.]

Oops, sorry for double (sort of) post. :-)

[dragnet2]

I shot this image of Venus Transit across the sun on 6/5/2012. Remember, Earth and Venus are pretty darn close in size.

Now keep in mind, Venus was still about 75,000,000 miles from the sun's surface when the image was shot. Now imagine it's size relative to the sun if it were placed just above the sun's surface. It would be about the size of a tiny dot, like the period you see here>(.)

And these people peddling global warming or climate change or whatever term these stooges are currently using, are trying to convince everyone that man, not the sun, is significantly affecting the climate on planet earth? From my perspective, this is a colossal farce, an unbelievable hoax created by people with bad intentions to control humans on this planet.

[dragnet2]

Whoop, 23 was meant for your comment.

[SaveFerris]

Yep - the order of magnitude is lost on the low-I.Q. crowd, though.

[SaveFerris]

Yep - the order of magnitude is lost on the low-I.Q. crowd, though.

[SaveFerris]

Yeah, the Global Warming crowd just....doesn’t....get....it.

[dragnet2]

If I were a betting man, I’d put money on a possible mini ice age approaching, based on patterns and time lines, not to mention what’s currently happening in the Midwest and Texas. Some of those temps I’ve seen and that far south, made me recoil. An extended period of cold weather coming is probably not that far fetched, regardless of what some at NASA say or claim.

[SaveFerris]

Sure feels like it here in the Midwest.

That would show God has a sense of humor. Turn the Left’s “Global Warming religion” back on them like that.

[SaveFerris]

Sure feels like it here in the Midwest.

That would show God has a sense of humor. Turn the Left’s “Global Warming religion” back on them like that.

[dragnet2]

Yep, the leftist kept getting the hood slammed on their heads with the “Global Warming” term, so they changed it to climate change. What an epic con-job.

[null and void]

Will your faith collapse into a quivering blob if they find life?

[lee martell]

Not at all. I’ve been expecting the official admission of such discoveries for a long time.
Let’s not forget that we Homosapiens probably descend from such quivering blobs.

[SaveFerris]

[What an epic con-job.]

And it made Al Gore even richer, what with his big homes and jet travel.

And the fools still believe in him. I’d LOL if it wasn’t so pathetic.

[SaveFerris]

[a quivering blob]

Are we talking about a Steve McQueen movie here?

[dfwgator]

Don’t you dare suggest “6-minute Abs” are possible!

"7's the key number here. Think about it. 7-Elevens. 7 dwarves. 7, man, that's the number. 7 chipmunks twirlin' on a branch, eatin' lots of sunflowers on my uncle's ranch. You know that old children's tale from the sea. It's like you're dreamin' about Gorgonzola cheese when it's clearly Brie time, baby. Step into my office."

[null and void]

Thanks, me too! (although I do prefer to think we ascended from quivering blobs...)

[entropy12]

hahahaha nice irony and sarcasm.

[null and void]

He never did succeed in buying up and destroying every copy of that movie...

[lee martell]

That sounds better!