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Stunning photos from NASA’s new Mars rover reveal 200-foot cliffs, mysterious rocks, and a perfect touchdown

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mars rover perseverance helicoper ingenuity
An artist's illustration shows NASA's Perseverance rover along with Ingenuity helicopter around Mars.

NASA’s brand new Mars rover, Perseverance, has beamed back thousands of stunning photographs .
Sports cameras listed the rover’s descent and landing.
Now Perseverance’s navigation and science cameras are capturing an early Martian lake bed.
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NASA’s Perseverance rover has not started roaming the red planet just yet, however its cameras have been busy at work.

A suite of ruggedized, off-the-shelf cameras recorded unprecedented footage of the rover descending to Mars and landing in Jezero Crater on Thursday. Then the rover’s navigation and science cameras began snapping away when it had been on the ground. The results are breathtaking.

Thus far, NASA has released over 4,700 pictures from the rover, with a lot more to come.

“It’s been a firehose of data,” Justin Maki, also a Perseverance imaging scientist and the chief of the instrument-operations team, stated in a media conference on Monday.

The new photographs show the sand dunes, stones, and distant 200-foot-tall cliffs of the ancient lake bed in which Perseverance now stays. It is the most toxic terrain almost any Mars landing has targeted, but it’s already paying off in unprecedented portraits of the red planet.

“I review images for Mars, like, every day. That’s what I do. And when I saw these images come down, I have to say, I was truly amazed,” Maki said. “I know it’s been a tough year for everybody, and we’re hoping that maybe these images will help brighten people’s day.”

After landing on Thursday, NASA’s Perseverance rover instantly began beaming back thousands of photographs of the red planet.

perseverance rover mars landing first color images photo jezero crater
The first high-resolution, colour image sent back from the Hazard Cameras (Hazcams) around the bottom of Perseverance.

Included in these are the first-ever pictures of a rover landing on Mars. Five cameras recorded over 23,000 pictures during Perseverance’s descent.

perseverance mars rover landing photo
A photo of NASA's Perseverance rover only feet over the Martian surface – portion of a movie many cameras listed of the landing on February 18, 2021.

NASA has also released a three-minute movie of the rover’s descent and landing. Watch it and see more here.

The cameras began recording as the pill carrying the rover set up a 70-foot-wide parachute to slow its fall during the Martian air.

mars perseverance rover descent landing parachute deploy nasa
A camera attached into the Perseverance rover's entrance capsule recorded this image of the parachute deploying.

Hidden at the parachute’s design is binary video code spelled out the message”Dare mighty things.”

perseverance mars landing video nasa
A screengrab from the brand new video shows the Perseverance capsule's parachute deploying.

When the base panel of the capsule fell away, that exposed just a camera on the base of the rover, which recorded Jezero Crater below.

perseverance mars rover landing capsule heat shield jettison deploy video screengrab
A screengrab out of Perseverance's landing video shows the heat defense falling off, exposing a camera on the rover's gut as it descends to Mars.

Within this ancient lake bed, Perseverance is set to search for signs of ancient alien microbes which could be fossilized there, particularly across the river delta that formerly filled the crater with plain water.

nasa perseverance mars rover landing video jezero crater
A screengrab from the Perseverance rover's descent and shooting shows Jezero Crater, with the 200-foot cliffs of its river delta on the right.

Read more about Jezero Crater and its possible for alien life here.

All these pictures had to be colour corrected. Here is what they looked like before that.

mars perseverance rover descent landing jezero crater river delta no color correction
A camera at the base of NASA's Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image through descent on February 18, 2021. It’s never been color corrected.

During the landing, the pill fell the rover, then a jetpack attached to Perseverance’s rear fired its engines flew into the landing site. There, it lowered the rover on 25-foot nylon wires.

perseverance mars rover landing jetpack
A camera on top of Perseverance caught the jetpack lowering the rover into its landing spot.

As it approached, the jetpack’s motors kicked up swirling clouds of dust on the Martian surface.

perseverance mars rover landing video screengrab
A screengrab from the rover's descent-camera video shows dust swirling below as the rover is going to touch down.

Then the jetpack released the rover and sailed off to crash-land at a secure distance.

perseverance mars rover landing jetpack
After delivering Perseverance into its touchdown, the jetpack sparks the nylon cable and hastens away.

Before the dust settled, then the rover was beaming back its first photographs from the Martian surface.

perseverance rover mars landing first images nasa
The initial (left) and second (right) pictures that Perseverance took seconds after landing on Mars, February 18, 2021.

The first pictures showed some very holey stones that obtained NASA scientists eager. The stones could be submerged water might have tunneled through them.

perseverance mars rover wheel rocks holey rock jezero crater landing
One of Perseverance's colour Hazard Cameras (Hazcams) caught this image of a few of the rover's six aluminum wheels following its landing on February 18, 2021.

Over the weekend, NASA engineers taught Perseverance to set up its mast. That gave a far better view of the landscape and the rover.

perseverance rover mars navcam screengrab
A screengrab from a NASA press conference demonstrating a color-approximated variant of a Navcam photo of the rover's body.

The rover’s Mastcam-Z camera, also named for its strong zoom lens, used a colour wheel built into the rover to calibrate itself.

perseverance mars rover nasa

“We’re going to get incredibly high-resolution photos from this imaging system,” Maki said.

perseverance mars rover jezero crater sand
NASA's Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image using a Mastcam-Z camera, situated high on the rover's mast.

High on its mast, Perseverance’s Navcam camera may view everything. It will assist the rover drive.

perseverance rover mars navcam photo jezero crater screengrab
A screengrab from a NASA press conference shows a color-approximated variant of a Navcam picture, looking southwest.

On the west of the rover, the Navcam can see the cliffs of the river delta on the horizon. That’s where the rover is directed.

perseverance rover mars navcam jezero crater river delta cliffs screengrab
A screengrab from a NASA press conference shows a color-approximated variant of a Navcam photo looking west toward the lake delta cliffs.

The Perseverance team on Earth stitched six of these pictures together to make a 360-degree panorama.

perseverance mars rover panorama jezero crater nasa
This panorama, accepted on February 20, 2021, from the Navigation Cameras about the Perseverance Mars roverthat was stitched together from six separate pictures.

NASA switched that panorama into a movie which you can drag left and right to see the view out of Perseverance’s view.

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