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Seven years of work, seven months of flight in space and nearly seven minutes of anguish: the American probe InSight is finally ready to touch the surface of Mars on Monday by a very risky landing maneuver.
NASA engineers who follow the operation from Earth can only cross their fingers: from entering the Martian atmosphere, with its dust storms, to contact with the ground, everything has been scheduled hours in advance.
Even more cruel, the signal that InSight is safe on the Martian surface will take eight minutes to reach the Mission Control Center in Pasadena, California.
"With Mars, nothing is ever badured, Mars is difficult," said Thomas Zurbuchen, head of NASA's science section, who approved the nearly $ 1 billion mission to study the bowels of the red planet.
This is the first time since 2012 that the artifact is attempting to land on Mars, after NASA's Curiosity vehicle, the only currently active on the surface of the red planet, l '# 39; did.
Only the United States managed to place artifacts there, investing in these missions in order to prepare. a future incursion with human explorers by the 2030s. But more than half of 43 attempts to bring robots, satellites or others onto Mars – executed by space agencies around the world integer – failed.
$ 993 million, aims to record the movements, tremors of the red planet, which formed millions of years ago as a rocky planet, as the Earth, but no mystery
Faster than a bullet
InSight must penetrate obliquely into the atmosphere of Mars to avoid shattering.
NASA reported that "two hours before reaching the atmosphere, the team's Entry, Descent and Landing (EDL) brought some final modifications to the algorithm that will guide the spacecraft to the surface. "
" This will be the last orders sent to InSight before it's robotically guided the rest of the way. "
Just rub in at Atmosphere for the temperature to increase rapidly up to 1,500 ° C, but the probe is prepared with a reinforced thermal shield to withstand the impact.
The probe will then move at around 20 000 km / h. , between three and four times faster than a rifle bullet, and aims to reach a rectangular area of about 10 km by 24 km. After leaving a point on Earth at 480 million kilometers, "it's like you're marking a goal at 130,000 kilometers," NASA said.
Four minutes and a hundred kilometers away, a parachute will open automatically, slowing down the descent. Then, once the heat shield is deployed, the aircraft will open its three feet and the parachute will detach.
"We'll be in free fall for a brief moment, something that's absolutely terrifying to consider for me," said Tom Hoffman, InSight Project Leader for NASA
The Probe Will Quickly Light Up Its 12 Retro-Rockets which will slow down the aircraft to about 8 km / h, which will then weigh no more than 365 kg.
Almost seven minutes after his first contact With the atmosphere, InSight should finally "knead".
Magma and Temperature
Meanwhile, dubbed "the six and a half minutes of terror" by some, nothing and no one could witness InSight to correct their trajectory or
"I am completely relaxed, but in same time completely nervous, "said Hoffman.
"We have made every effort to ensure the success of the mission, but we never know what can happen," he said, acknowledging that he had not "been able to to sleep very well "lately.
The engineer and his colleagues, including many European scientists who provided the advanced instruments that travel on board. InSight, they must wait to receive the first signal sent by the probe. Only there, you can be sure that he is intact and well stabilized on his three feet.
InSight will then slowly deploy the solar panels that will power your instruments. A busy work schedule now awaits.
He has to listen to and examine the interior of Mars to try to unravel the mysteries of his formation, billions of years ago. Knowledge that could eventually help to better understand the formation of the Earth, the only rocky planet from which its interior has been really studied.
InSight is equipped with a French design seismometer, SIX, which will be placed directly on Martian soil. you will hear the smallest vibrations: waves of meteoric shock, movements of the earth, cracks of rocky strata, even deep magma movements …
Another remarkable instrument, of German origin, is the HP3, which must dig between 3 to 5 meters from the surface of Mars to take its temperature.
The ship's wind sensors are of Spanish design.
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