The first pictures of Mars .. fascinate NASA scientists

As soon as it touched the surface of Mars last Thursday, the Perseverance spacecraft, which weighs 1050 kg, and costs two billion and 700 million dollars, transmitted the first image of an area of ​​Jesero crater, where it landed to study its geological situation, and to search for 687 days for any trace of life that sprouted in its environment in the distant past of the planet, Because Jezero was 3 billion and 500 million years ago, like a lake with a diameter of 49 km, rich in water flowing into it from two channels that appear in the pictures as they delt from a river that split into two branches.

After that, the spacecraft continued to take pictures of the surrounding area and send them to the NASA control team on the ground, which are images published by Al-Arabiya.net with an explanation on the website of the US space agency itself. As for the exciting among them, they are published below, and were picked up by a NASA probe called the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been orbiting around Mars since 2006. The spacecraft appeared in it after it entered its airspace and a parachute reduced its speed to its pre-prepared landing site, and a radar installed in it led it to it.

The second is exciting, in which the vehicle appears to have landed on the surface of the planet, after it has separated from what they call the “heat shield”, which is designed to protect it from the high heat caused by its friction with the planet’s airspace when it enters it, then a parachute with a diameter of 21 meters took care of it, and when When it reached a 31-square-meter circle from the crater, prepared in advance for its landing, it separated from it and handed it over to another landing mechanism.

The other landing mechanism is a “celestial platform” known in English as the skycrane. The speed of the descent is reduced by reverse jetting, from which the vehicle descended hanging with special ropes and wires, according to what “Al Arabiya.net” read on the NASA host website that the image was taken by a camera installed in the “celestial platform.” It transmitted it to the spacecraft when it settled on the Martian dermis, and in turn, the craft sent it to Earth, then the “platform” separated from it to crash in another place.

As for the third picture, I picked it up A camera in the vehicle for one of the 6 wheels, which will begin next week to roam through the promising crater, while the fourth image is a graphic from “NASA” about the new navigation technology related to the terrain “to avoid dangers and find a safe place to land in the Jezero crater on Mars,” as the graphic explains, the publication With the wheel picture below, blue areas are safe in the crater for landing, and red areas are not valid, because they are rugged and thorny with pits and rocks that may interfere with Perseverance's wandering on Mars, which it reached after traveling 471 million kilometers in a journey that took 203 days, at a speed of 96.000 kilometers per hour. .

The largest visit to Mars will reveal a lot about the Red Planet

Engineers dazzled by NASA photos

In the graphic image, we find that the landing area is colored green, as distinguished by a report from the “Jet Propulsion Laboratory” evaluating the most sophisticated and complex of the Mars missions that NASA has carried out so far, given that Perseverance is equipped with a technological cocktail enhanced with artificial intelligence that was not Fortunately for any other spacecraft.

Scientists and engineers at “NASA” were fascinated by the pictures, though they were few, and one of them is Steve Collins, the steering control expert at the “Birth Propulsion Laboratory” in California, said yesterday, that it “leaves minds in a daze and amazement,” adding that the American space agency “got some great things.” Really,” he said.