The launch didn’t cause the spectacular light show that set off awe (and some panic) during some previous Vandenberg launches, but early risers took to social media to share their glimpses. Liftoff of #AtlasV visible from our #ElSegundo offices. LIVE NOW: Watch the 7:05am ET liftoff of lander to Mars where it'll study the planet's deep interior! … PHOTOS: All systems go for InSight’s historic launch. Historically, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, based in La Canada Flintridge, has launched its robotic missions to Mars out of Cape Canaveral.Ī pair of briefcase-size satellites will launch aboard InSight, break free after liftoff, then follow the spacecraft for six months all the way to Mars. LIFTOFF! Humanity’s next mission to Mars has left the pad! heads into space for a ~6 month journey to Mars where it will take the planet’s vital signs and help us understand how rocky planets formed. “I can’t think of a better way to start my day!” Bridenstine tweeted.Īssociated Press writer John Antczak in Pasadena, California, contributed to this report. Not even two weeks on the job, NASA’s new administrator, Bridenstine, observed the launch on monitors at space agency headquarters in Washington. The rocket’s bright orange flame was visible for some time as it arced upward across the dark sky west of greater Los Angeles. It was a marvelous sight, though, farther south. It was so foggy at Vandenberg that spectators there could hear and feel the roar and rumble of the rocket, but couldn’t see it. interplanetary mission to launch from somewhere other than Cape Canaveral. NASA normally launches from Cape Canaveral, but decided to switch to California for InSight to take advantage of a shorter flight backlog. Problems with the French-supplied seismometer kept InSight from launching two years ago. “InSight, for seismologists, will really be a piece of history, a new page of history,” said the Paris Institute of Earth Physics’ Philippe Lognonne, lead scientist of the InSight seismometer. The lander is equipped with a seismometer for measuring marsquakes, a self-hammering probe for burrowing beneath the surface, and a radio system for tracking the spacecraft’s position and planet’s wobbly rotation, thereby revealing the size and composition of Mars’ core. Over the course of two Earth years - or one Martian year - scientists expect InSight’s three main experiments to provide a true 3-D image of the interior of Mars. Unlike our active Earth, Mars hasn’t been transformed by plate tectonics and other processes, he noted. InSight’s principal scientist, Bruce Banerdt of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, said Mars is ideal for learning how the rocky planets of our solar system formed 4.5 billion years ago. “This is of fundamental importance to understand the origin of our solar system and how it became the way it is today.” “This mission will probe the interior of another terrestrial planet, giving us an idea of the size of the core, the mantle, the crust and our ability then to compare that with the Earth,” said NASA’s chief scientist Jim Green. Once down, it will stay put, using a mechanical arm to place the science instruments on the surface. If all goes well, the three-legged InSight will descend by parachute and engine firings onto a flat equatorial region of Mars - believed to be free of big, potentially dangerous rocks - on Nov. Only about 40 percent of all missions to Mars from all countries - orbiters and landers alike - have proven successful over the decades. The U.S., in fact, is the only country to successfully land and operate a spacecraft at Mars. NASA hasn’t put a spacecraft down on Mars since the Curiosity rover in 2012. The $1 billion mission involves scientists from the U.S., France, Germany and elsewhere in Europe. They popped off the rocket’s upper stage in hot pursuit of InSight, as elated launch controllers applauded and shook hands following the morning’s success. The Atlas V rocket also gave a lift to a pair of mini test satellites, or CubeSats, meant to trail InSight all the way to Mars and then serve as a potential communication link. It will also attempt to make the first measurements of marsquakes, using a high-tech seismometer placed directly on the Martian surface. InSight will dig deeper into Mars than ever before - nearly 16 feet, or 5 meters - to take the planet’s temperature. InSight launches its mission to Mars early Saturday. The spacecraft, including cruise stage and lander, was built and tested by Lockheed Martin Space in Denver. JPL is managing the InSight project for NASA’s Discovery Program. The spacecraft will take more than six months to get to Mars and start its unprecedented geologic excavations, traveling 300 million miles (485 million kilometers) to get there.
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