NASA’s Mars Probe: Never-before-seen video emerges – ‘Look closely’

It’s been almost a year since NASA for you Persevere on the Mars Rover deposited on the surface of the red planet. Since then, the car has been searching for signs of life, but it also continues to make other discoveries. Recently, however, the car had to perform a maneuver that few of those involved had previously imagined.

NASA’s Mars probe spits rocks

On December 29, NASA encountered an unexpected obstacle. When he was supposed to store the rock samples he collected, bits of them fell out of the tube into the rotating mechanism of his drilling tool. This is blocked as a result.

What followed was a procedure that NASA did not practice in advance and simply applied “directly,” as stated in a blog post. he is called. As she put it, none of the scientists involved could have imagined this. she writes:

“(…) the team began a robotic-arm maneuver that I never would have imagined—ever. In short, we have returned the remaining contents of sample tube 261 (the most recent rock specimen collected) to its home planet.”

Jennifer Trosper, Projektmanager am NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)

NASA also has an interview video via Percy’s Twitter account. Spread. Shows small pieces falling from the Mars rover’s drill. To achieve this, it was held towards the ground and rotated at the appropriate speed. The car “declares” that:

“In order to continue (running) #SamplingMars, I unloaded my latest partial sample. Watch closely to see a piece of excavated rock fall to the ground in this movie. Fortunately I can reuse the tube for a new sample of the same stone.”

Twitter / @NASAPersevere

Not the first wrong hole for NASA

What seemed so easy took several days to finish. In the first step on January 15, the stuck stone was first loosened. After more effort, the remainder of the rock was removed on January 20.

This was not the first such incident of perseverance, it was only in early January An anomaly in the exercises paralyzed the Mars rover. And there were complications with his first sample set on the Red Planet. which was then The stone collected by NASA suddenly disappeared.

Sources: NASA Mars Mission 2020, Twitter / @NASAPersevere