With just 10 days left for NASA‘s fifth Mars rover, Perseverence, to land on the red planet, I was reminded of Ingenuity – the first helicopter to be sent to Mars on the chassis of Perseverence and named by a 17-year old girl! This was more than 10 months ago when the young girl bagged the honour of naming the helicopter.
But, who knew at that point that a microscopic virus (Coronavirus) would wreak havoc across our planet and stop everything right in its path. It is ironic that at a point when we are on the brink of investigating life beyond Earth, a virus sweeps across the planet in a manner that forces us to evaluate our preparedness to new lifeforms. But Ingenuity and Perseverence, pun intended, although a bit delayed, are finally approaching their finish line after travelling almost 470 million kilometres from earth to Mars. February 18, 2021, is the D-day when Perseverence is scheduled to land on Mars and help humanity find fundamental answers to the possibility of life beyond Earth.
Click here to know more about Perseverence’s first date with Mars. And click here to experience an immersive simulation of the Mars rover in its last crucial 7 minutes (developed by NASA). Simulations are the first step to any development, be it the design of a bicycle, optical fiber system or Mars rover! In fact, it is with great pride that I write this knowing that children of C2L Club are fully aware of the importance of simulations. Just last week, we were playing with the simulations of projectile motion and wondering about how rockets change their trajectories within Eath’s atmosphere (soon to be addressed in an upcoming post!). These simulations by NASA allows one to experience the various stages of how the rover will eventually land on the Red Planet while going the stages such as alignment of the head, deployment of the parachute, separation of the heat shield, separation of the rover itself and so on. My 9-year old definitely had a lot of fun viewing the rover from all angles and seeing how it plans to take the first small step towards humanity’s future.
You can even watch the landing event online (live!). Find the full schedule of the Perseverence landing here!
