5/29/2023 0 Comments Pensacola radar in motion![]() ![]() She can “rover at a top speed of 0.1 MPH,” said Zarifian.Įngineers also commanded Perseverance to ‘wiggle’ each of her four corner wheels to check out and test the wheels before driving. Perseverance is designed with the capability for regular commutes extending 656 feet (200 meters) or more after the mission kicks into high gear roving as soon as this summer to pursue her science goals. The first drive lasted about 33 minutes altogether to propel the rover forward 13 feet (4 meters) and then she turned in place 150 degrees to the left and backed up 8 feet (2.5 meters) into the “new temporary parking space.”Īlong the way the science and engineering team commanded Perseverance to snap images of the drive and turn in progress as well as of the touchdown site itself using the Navigation (Navcam) and Hazard Avoidance (Hazcam) Cameras “to help better understand the dynamics of a retrorocket landing on the Red Planet … where Perseverance touched down, dispersing Martian dust with plumes from its engines.” On Sol 3, the Mastcam-Z instrument on Perseverance captured this 360-degree panorama. The drive served as a mobility test that marks just one of many milestones as team members check out and calibrate every system, subsystem, and instrument on Perseverance, the team noted. We are now confident our drive system is good to go, capable of taking us wherever the science leads us over the next two years.” This image was taken during the first drive of NASA’s Perseverance rover on Mars by the rover’s Navigation Cameras. ![]() The rover’s six-wheel drive responded superbly. “This was our first chance to ‘kick the tires’ and take Perseverance out for a spin. “When it comes to wheeled vehicles on other planets, there are few first-time events that measure up in significance to that of the first drive,” said Anais Zarifian, Mars 2020 Perseverance rover mobility testbed engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. On her first drive on the Red Plant Perseverance moved 21.3 feet (6.5 meters) across the Martian landscape, said the team at a media briefing Friday afternoon, March 5. It takes about 24 hours for the images to be transmitted via the fleet of 4 NASA and ESA Martian orbiters soaring overhead. Since the safe touchdown Perseverance has already snapped over 7,000 images including those after the first drive taken yesterday and transmitted to Earth by today. The first test drive may have been short but it marked a tremendous boost for the team going ahead knowing that Perseverance is fully capable to meet the hopes and goals of the mission and carry out groundbreaking science on her astrobiology mission to search for signs of ancient Martian microbes and gather samples for return to Earth about a decade from now. 18, 2021, after a seven-month interplanetary voyage through space and surviving the ‘7 Minutes of Terror’ plunge through the tenuous atmosphere. ![]() Butler Landing” where the six-wheeled robot touched down safely two weeks ago on Feb. ![]() NASA’s Perseverance rover performed its first test drive on Martain terrain on March 4, or Sol 14, the mission team announced with the release of a batch of dramatic new images captured at the landing site now bearing the name “Octavia E. One of the front-mounted Hazard Avoidance Cameras (Hazcams) captured this image as the Perseverance rover completed a short traverse during its first test drive on Mars on Sol 14 (March 4, 2021). ![]()
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