NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover recently captured a mesmerizing blue sunset at approximately 5:04:58.610 PM with its Navcam. The blue color near the Sun isn’t because of the clouds of water ice, but rather the Martian dust itself.
NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover recently captured a 1.2-mile-tall dust devil making its way along Thorofare Ridge. This ridge is located on the western rim of Mars’ Jezero Crater and the dust devil was determined to be moving east to west at about 12 mph.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has finally arrived at Gediz Vallis Ridge after a 3-year journey, the remnant of a powerful debris flows that carried mud and boulders down the side of a large mountain three billion years ago, one of the last wet periods on Mars. This debris was spread out and was later eroded by wind into a towering ridge.
NASA’s Perseverance rover recently captured a couple of rocks that look like a fossilized shark fin and crab claw. It used its Right Mastcam-Z camera, which can take color photos / video and three-dimensional stereo images, on Aug. 18, 2023 (Sol 886) at the local mean solar time of 12:25:43.
NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover observed the Ingenuity helicopter successfully completing its 54th flight on August 3, 2023. The recorded video shows Ingenuity performing a pre-flight check with its rotors ahead of take off. It then hovers at an altitude of 16 feet (5 meters) and rotates to the left, before safely landing.
We’ve seen NASA’s Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV) recently complete its latest motor test, now a prototype Mars Sample Return lander shows how it’s capable of absorbing the impact of the heaviest spacecraft ever to touch down on the Red Planet at 5,016 pounds (2,275 kilograms). The spacecraft would be carrying a rocket that would launch Perseverance’s samples to an awaiting orbiter.
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter just completed its 54th flight after an abrupt landing during the previous journey. More specifically, Flight 53 was initially going to last 136-seconds, dedicated to collecting imagery of the planet’s surface, but a flight-contingency program was triggered after just 74-seconds.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover attempts its most challenging climb yet at a location nicknamed ‘Jau’, which is dented with impact craters. This is just one step on the rover’s journey to Mount Sharp, a 3-mile-tall mountain on the Red Planet that was once covered with lakes, rivers and streams billions of years ago.
NASA’s Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV) successfully tested a development motor based on the second-stage solid rocket motor design at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The actual launch will be handled by using two solid rocket motors – SRM1 and SRM2 – with the first one propelling MAV away from the Red Planet’s surface.
NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover used its SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman and Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals) instrument to study several rocks around a rocky outcrop called ‘Skinner Ridge’ in the Jezero Crater. This instrument, located on the rover’s robotic arm, can study the chemical makeup of rocks by analyzing how they scatter light.