NASA robot finds parachute to land on Mars

Perseverance’s MastCam-Z camera takes pictures of the parachute and backplate from a long distance south of the robot’s current location. The photo was taken on April 6, 2022.

Typically, at the beginning of a mission, the rover will circle to the side to take pictures of the rest of the landing system. But Perseverance had to run around some rough terrain to reach the large area at Jezero crater that scientists wanted to study, called the South Séítah. That area is near the location where the parachute fell. The parachute was discarded during the landing sequence so that the skycrane could bring the robot down to the ground on wheels.

Previously, the spacecraft’s HiRISE camera orbiting Mars Reconnaissance also recorded the position of parachutes and protective panels, along with the position of the rover and other objects from the landing process. The photo was taken the day after Perseverance landed. The robot is located in the center of the collision zone created by the skycrane. The device then flew away and crashed to the ground at a safe distance, creating a V-shaped trail.

Now, Perseverance is moving towards the next goal in the mission’s second science campaign, which is land that looks like a large river delta. The robot is running faster than any vehicle before, even reaching speeds of less than 160 meters per hour. Perseverance is using auto-navigation for navigation and is moving relatively quickly due to running on flat terrain for several hours a day.

Perseverance broke the previous rover’s record for distance traveled in a day with 319.8 m on day 351 on Mars. Curiosity ran more than 100m on some trips but never exceeded 200m due to operating on more rocky terrain. The Opportunity robot that landed in 2004 travels up to 228 meters a day using solar energy.

An Khang (According to Science Alert)