NASA s Perseverance rover is ready to land on Mars foxnews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from foxnews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Mars rover faces seven minutes of terror before it lands msn.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from msn.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
If NASA successfully lands its fifth rover on Mars on Thursday, it will have delivered the Red Planet’s first microphones, its first aircraft, more cameras than ever before and a life-detecting duo known as SHERLOC and WATSON.
The Perseverance rover will also hopefully complete the initial step in an estimated 10-year effort to return samples of Martian rock back to Earth-bound researchers.
The rover carries a drill that can collect around 40 core samples, some 30 of which will be returned to Earth in the 2031 timeframe though that plan could change.
With luck, however, scientists won’t have to wait a decade for evidence of early Martian life.
For seven minutes on Thursday, NASA engineers will be on pins and needles as the Perseverance rover makes it way from the top of the Martian atmosphere to the surface.