We start this week with news from Mars, because, let’s face it, the news from this planet isn’t all that much fun lately. But a couple of milestones were reached on the Red Planet, the first being the arrival of Perseverance at the ancient river delta it was sent there to explore. The rover certainly took the scenic route to get there, having covered 10.6 km over the last 424 sols to move to a position only about 3.5 km straight-line distance from where it landed. Granted, a lot of that extra driving was in support of the unexpectedly successful Ingenuity demonstration, plus taking time for a lot of pit stops along the way at interesting features. But the rover is now in place to examine sedimentary rocks most likely to harbor the fossil remains of ancient aquatic life — as opposed to the mainly igneous rocks it has studied along the crater floor so far. We’re looking forward to seeing what happens.
Speaking of Ingenuity, the plucky helicopter just keeps on performing. It recently completed its 27th flight — of five planned flights, mind you — and spotted the crashed remains of the aeroshell and parachute from its spectacular arrival last February. They look quite the worse for the wear, but that’s to be expected. The stunningly high-resolution pictures Ingenuity sent back will no doubt be pored over by engineers for whatever clues it holds about how the structure stood up to descent and landing conditions. We’re not sure, but this may be the first time a landing or crash site has been revisited since Allan Bean absolutely nailed the Apoll ..
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