NASA's JPL is celebrating another successful flight for the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter. The helicopter has now flown a total of one mile since its first flight. Its most recent test flight targeted an area known as "Raised Ridges."
Scientists from the Royal Astronomical Society have released a new study investigating a gigantic dust storm that enveloped the entire planet of Mars in 2018. As the dust storm engulfed the entire planet, it destroyed a vortex of cold air around the planet's south pole, resulting in early spring in the hemisphere. While the dust storm destroyed the cold air vortex around the South Pole, it only resulted in minor distortions to the polar vortex in the northern hemisphere resulting in no dramatic seasonal changes.
In 2018, a NASA spacecraft called InSight landed on the surface of Mars. Before InSight landed on the surface, all other missions, including rovers and orbiters studying Mars, concentrated on the surface of the Red Planet. However, InSight was different because it was designed to study Mars' interior using a seismometer.
NASA's Perseverance may have been on Mars since February, but the rover is only now preparing to take its very first sample of red planet rock. It's taken more than a month of exploration in Jezero Crater, the location NASA selected to land Perseverance for the strongest chance of discovering ancient signs of life, to identify the best candidate spot for a multi-stage sampling process.
NASA has announced that the Perseverance rover has completed testing the instruments on its robotic arm and is ready to get down to business. That business will see Perseverance testing rocks and dust for evidence of past life on the surface of the Red Planet. The rover has a seven-foot-long mechanical arm that has several instruments attached to the end.
Scientists are eager to look for any form of life on the surface of Mars. The consensus is that sometime in the distant past, Mars may have been hospitable to life of some type. Some also believe that Mars might currently harbor microbial life and point to increased levels of methane seen in some areas as proof.
NASA has announced that it will be holding a briefing on early science discoveries from the Perseverance Mars Rover next week. The virtual media briefing will take place at 1 PM EDT on Wednesday, July 21. At the briefing, NASA will discuss early science results from the Perseverance Mars Rover, among other topics.
NASA's Perseverance rover may plot a scientific course that previously might have been deemed too risky, with the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter providing mission control with unexpected insight from the sky. Though Ingenuity has only flown nine missions so far - albeit groundbreaking experiments in their own right - the photography gathered by the helicopter is proving vital for making the most of Perseverance's time on the red planet.
NASA's Curiosity rover is currently conducting science operations on the surface of the Red Planet in Gale Crater. Scientists have long believed that this crater was once an ancient lake, and many of the rocks Curiosity is rolling over were once sediments at the bottom of that lake. A new study was published this week that helps to add to the understanding of where the rock record preserved or destroyed evidence of a moist past on the surface of Mars and potential signs of ancient life.
NASA has announced that Ingenuity, its small Martian helicopter, successfully passed its ninth and most challenging flight thus far, marking a new milestone for the surprisingly capable vehicle. Unlike past flights, NASA used the most recent flight to pit Ingenuity against "challenging terrain," not to mention the ample distance traveled.
NASA JPL is celebrating the ninth successful flight of the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter. The successful flight was celebrated with a tweet on July 5, along with some mission details. The flight is described as its most challenging yet seeing Ingenuity in the air for 166.4 seconds.
The European Space Agency (ESA) has announced that it has completed the first high-altitude drop test for the ExoMars parachute system. The successful test was completed after delays due to several weeks of bad weather and strong winds. ESA conducted a pair of drop tests in Kiruna, Sweden. The agency reports that the large 15 meter-wide first stage main parachute performed flawlessly at supersonic speeds.