NASA’s Mars Rover successfully landed on the Red Planet; brining humanity the closest it has ever been to actually visiting another planet. The NASA website tells us that the main job of Perseverance is to ‘seek signs of ancient life and collect samples of rock and regolith (broken rock and soil) for possible return to Earth’. For anyone with the remotest interest in the cosmos, this is truly amazing. The actual pictures beamed back to earth tell us what a bid deal this is for humankind:
There was celebration among the scientific community when the Mars Rover called Perseverance successfully touched down on the surface of Mars. It then proceeded to beam back high-quality images of the process and the landscape on Mars.
Images such as these are being released to give us an idea of what the surface of Mars looks like.
This is a picture of the horizon of Mars and the hope of much to explore.
The scientists are still feeling their way ---this is a literal exploration because there is so much that we don’t know about the planet.
This trip to Mars is the culmination of years of hard work. In this connection, people remember American astronomer Percival Lowell who had claimed that there were canals on Mars. It was also due to his efforts that Pluto was ultimately discovered.
The team at NASA knew that there was much that could have gone wrong. For the team of scientists involved in this, the moment of successful touchdown had to have been one of relief, happiness and a towering sense of achievement.
The city hall of Los Angeles was lit up in red to mark the landing on Mars.
The city hall in that city was also illuminated red.
This was the tallest building in the world for a while – and still dominates the Manhattan skyline. This was also lit up in red
Perseverance’s landing on Mars is not just the accomplishment of the Americans. It is a huge step for humankind, which was acknowledged in various different ways in many places.
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