Explanation: Welcome to Mars, NASA Insight. Yesterday NASA's robotic spacecraft InSight made a dramatic landing on Mars after a six-month trek across the inner Solar System. Needing to brake from 20,000 km per hour to zero in about seven minutes, Insight decelerated by as much as 8 g's and heated up to 1500 degrees Celsius as it deployed a heat shield, a parachute, and at the end, rockets. The featured image was the first taken by InSight on Mars, and welcome proof that the spacecraft had shed enough speed to land softly and function on the red planet. During its final descent, InSight's rockets kicked up dust which can be seen stuck to the lens cap of the Instrument Context Camera. Past the spotty dirt, parts of the lander that are visible include cover bolts at the bottom and a lander footpad on the lower right. Small rocks are visible across the rusty red soil, while the arc across the top of the image is the Martian horizon dividing land and sky. Over the next few weeks InSight will deploy several scientific instruments, including a rumble-detecting seismometer. These instruments are expected to give humanity unprecedented data involving the interior of Mars, a region thought to harbor formation clues not only about Mars, but Earth.
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 5:26 am
by Boomer12k
I think it needs some LENS cleaner...
glad it landed safe and sound....looking forward to some great shots and data...
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Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 1:10 pm
by neufer
Why can't you see any stars
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 1:14 pm
by moconnor
The picture on APOD marks an area on the upper left that is mostly in the Mars sky. It says "Tether Storage Box". What does that refer to?
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 1:34 pm
by bls0326
I was watching NASA TV showing the JPL Control Room during the landing. Twenty or thirty extremely tense folks that could do nothing regarding the landing activities. After it landed and they could breathe again, they went to work. There is already a good lander/landscape shot on the NASA site. https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/insigh ... ys-on-mars
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 2:02 pm
by neufer
Click to play embedded YouTube video.
bls0326 wrote: ↑Tue Nov 27, 2018 1:34 pm
I was watching NASA TV showing the JPL Control Room during the landing. Twenty or thirty extremely tense folks that could do nothing regarding the landing activities. After it landed and they could breathe again, they went to work.
Went to work?
You call that work?
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 3:35 pm
by Guest
A most amazing achievement; yet with all those brilliant minds no one considered a disposable clear lens cover or way to clear the camera lens?
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 3:46 pm
by Chris Peterson
Guest wrote: ↑Tue Nov 27, 2018 3:35 pm
A most amazing achievement; yet with all those brilliant minds no one considered a disposable clear lens cover or way to clear the camera lens?
The lens cover simply hasn't been opened yet. It was made transparent so the camera functionality could be tested before doing that. In the meantime, the lens is protected while they go through their full diagnostic routines.
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Guest wrote: ↑Tue Nov 27, 2018 3:35 pm
A most amazing achievement; yet with all those brilliant minds no one considered a disposable clear lens cover or way to clear the camera lens?
The lens cover simply hasn't been opened yet. It was made transparent so the camera functionality could be tested before doing that. In the meantime, the lens is protected while they go through their full diagnostic routines.
As indicated, this landing was expected to kick up a lot of dust, so the lens cover was a great idea. Indeed, it appears to have been vital for camera lens protection, based on the amount of dust that was just imaged. I haven't been able to find out any details about the lens cap on the couple of sites I looked at. No doubt it will be removed at some point. I'm wondering if it can be placed back over the lens and removed again at will in the future? It may not be worth it to have that capability, but with Martian dust storms, it sounds like it might be a handy feature. Similarly, I wonder if anything could be done to protect the solar panels from dust accumulation. (When is the planned launch date for the Mars Roving Car Wash mission?)
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 5:06 pm
by MarkBour
APOD Robot wrote: ↑Tue Nov 27, 2018 5:07 am
... Needing to brake[/url] from 20,000 km per hour to zero in about seven minutes ... to land softly
... to give humanity unprecedented data involving the interior of Mars ...
I don't understand. If they want to study the interior of Mars, why slow down? A nice impact crater, maybe 100 feet deep should be revealing.
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
APOD Robot wrote: ↑Tue Nov 27, 2018 5:07 am
... Needing to brake[/url] from 20,000 km per hour to zero in about seven minutes ... to land softly
... to give humanity unprecedented data involving the interior of Mars ...
I don't understand. If they want to study the interior of Mars, why slow down? A nice impact crater, maybe 100 feet deep should be revealing.
At least, now that a seismometer will soon be in place, future high impact miscalculations will result in good data.
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 7:29 pm
by Tragic Astronomy
By design, by neglect
For a fact or just for effect
When they met, where they connect
At the confluence of travel and sex
More a trip than a quest
Plunged into the deeply freckled breast
Where to now? If I had to guess
I'm afraid to say Antarctica's next
Or Chagrin Falls, Ohio
Where the unknown won't even go
Re: APOD: InSight's First Image from Mars (2018 Nov 27)
APOD Robot wrote: ↑Tue Nov 27, 2018 5:07 am
... Needing to brake[/url] from 20,000 km per hour to zero in about seven minutes ... to land softly
... to give humanity unprecedented data involving the interior of Mars ...
I don't understand. If they want to study the interior of Mars, why slow down? A nice impact crater, maybe 100 feet deep should be revealing.
At least, now that a seismometer will soon be in place, future high impact miscalculations will result in good data.
NASA's InSight Mars lander acquired this image of the area in front of the lander using its lander-mounted, Instrument Context Camera (ICC).
This image was acquired on November 30, 2018, Sol 4 of the InSight mission where the local mean solar time for the image exposures was 13:27:07 PM. Each ICC image has a field of view of 124 x 124 degrees.
InSight's First Image from Mars
You call that work?
