3 Cheers for NASA, JPL and Percy

[Allyance]

I sat in awe of Nasa & JPL in the final hour as they monitored the decent. I thought that a forum dedicated to highly technical topics should pay homage to all the engineers and scientists that pulled this off with incredible accuracy.

Photo by NASA of Percy just before it touched down on the surface of Mars!

 

[ucfgrad93]

Simply amazing!

 

[mikzn]

Awesome

 

[Keukasmallie]

Looks like Utah to me....

 

[decafjava]

Can't wait to see how the helicopter does and what it discovers.

 

[Huntn]

I find it interesting is there is no real time control of these devices so much care has to be given with movement commands, with a delay of 4-24 minutes. From an older mission:

Time delay between Mars and Earth – Mars Express

ESA's mission to the Red Planet

blogs.esa.int

 

[ucfgrad93]

 

[ThunderSkunk]

Percy just before it touched down on the surface of Mars!
View attachment 1732432

Wait that thing made touchdown fully exposed? Holy pants. I thought it was landing cocooned in a bunch of air cushions. That's bonkers. I mean the whole thing was bonkers, and I was pretty sure I was going to see the medics rush in, bc it looked like there were a few heart attacks about to happen in that room.

What a wild ride, & a major leap forward for the autonomous robot overlords of the future. That the whole thing didn't break apart in a ball of fire, & instead figured out what it was supposed to do and how to do it, then adapted & improvised its way through the insanely complicated 20,000mph ballet while on fire & with a level of precision no human could orchestrate, & somehow didn't plummet out of the sky like an asteroid and leave a smoking crater in the ground...

The next major war, there should be no stopping the machines from ushering in a new era for for humankind.

 

[yaxomoxay]

Wait that thing made touchdown fully exposed? Holy pants. I thought it was landing cocooned in a bunch of air cushions.

That's how it was a few years ago. It's incredible what they can do now.

 

[rpmurray]

That the whole thing didn't break apart in a ball of fire, & instead figured out what it was supposed to do and how to do it, then adapted & improvised its way through the insanely complicated 20,000mph ballet while on fire & with a level of precision no human could orchestrate, & somehow didn't plummet out of the sky like an asteroid and leave a smoking crater in the ground...

That's how it was a few years ago. It's incredible what they can do now. RIP Mars Climate Orbiter and Schiaparelli Mars lander.

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[Allyance]

And we get all excited about a self driving car!!

 

[kdarling]

Wait that thing made touchdown fully exposed? Holy pants.

Check out this landing video from the crane and rover viewpoints. Right near the end, you can see the rover being lowered by the crane, and opening its wheels. Incredible.

 

[yaxomoxay]

We also got the first sounds!