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(dramatic instrumental)

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It's been called NASAs seven minutes of terror.

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The agonizing moment when decades

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of research and engineering,

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not to mention hundreds of millions of dollars

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will be put to the test as a spacecraft

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burns through the martian atmosphere,

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plummeting at thousands of miles per hour

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to gently land on the hard and unforgiving martian surface.

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Although we've done it before,

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landing on Mars is hard, and this mission is no different.

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(dramatic instrumental music)

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The world will watch with baited breath,

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as eight years worth of planning

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all comes down to these seven minutes,

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where those involved with the mission

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can only sit, watch, and hope that their creation survives.

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(engine rumbling)

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NASAs InSight, the first outer space robotic explorer

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to study the interior of Mars.

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Launched on a foggy morning, on May 5, 2018,

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NASAs newest martian explorer, the InSight lander

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is currently rocketing towards the red planet.

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At speeds of over 6,000 miles per hour,

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fast enough to cross the continental United States

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in less than 30 minutes.

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(intense orchestral music)

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Its mission?

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To give Mar's it's first ever internal check-up.

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The basic idea of InSight is to map out

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the deep, structure of Mars for the very first time.

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We're gonna map out the thickness of the crust,

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the size of the core, sorta get the first map

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of the inside of Mars.

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And on November 26, at precisely 12 o'clock Pacific time,

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if the InSight lander survives the fiery descent,

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it'll reach it's final destination.

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An 81 mile-long, 17 mile-wide plane,

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known as Elysium Planitia.

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We wanted a very boring site with not too many rocks,

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that way we could land safely, and also have a place

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where we could deploy the instruments,

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so that they wouldn't be rocks in the way

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of where we wanted to put the instrument.

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So we'll be landing in Elysium Planitia,

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it's about four degrees north of the equator of Mars.

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We have to be near the equator because we're solar powered,

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and we want to be able to last through the martian winter,

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so we need to be able to make sure we get enough sun

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during the wintertime.

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(gentle piano music)

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A location with extended sunlight

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will prove key to the success

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of the craft's two year undertaking.

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But perhaps the most important in choosing a landing site

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was minimizing the dangers to the spacecraft,

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and its 825 million dollar mission.

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There's a lot of constraints we had to deal with.

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One of them was that we had to have enough atmosphere

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above us to allow us to slow down for landing,

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so that we had a good site that was far enough down

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and not too high in elevation.

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The atmosphere of Mars is actually very, very thin.

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So you actually have to take it into account,

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so that you slow down as you enter the atmosphere,

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or otherwise you could burn up.

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So we also have to use not only a heat shield,

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but a parachute and rockets to land on Mars gently.

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Landing on Mars is one of the most difficult

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and precise maneuvers in space exploration.

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The process known as entering, descent, and landing

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will have the InSight team at the edge of their seats

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as they helplessly wait to hear a faint signal

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telling them the spacecraft survived the harrowing

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six minutes and 45 seconds it'll take to reach martian soil.

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(building orchestral music)

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It takes thousands of steps to go from

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the top of the atmosphere to the surface.

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And each one of them has to work perfectly

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to be a successful mission.

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And on Monday, November 26 at 12 p.m. Pacific time,

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we'll learn whether or not

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InSight survives it's plunge into Mars.

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Just seven minutes before arriving to the top

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of the Mars atmosphere, is to separate the cruise stage.

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Before you hit the top the atmosphere though,

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the space capsule has to orient itself

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so that the heat shield is precisely facing the atmosphere.

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Now the fun begins.

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The vehicle is moving at nearly 13 thousand miles an hour,

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but it's hitting the top of the atmosphere

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at a very shallow angle: 12 degrees.

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Any steeper, the vehicle will hit the thicker part

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of the atmosphere and will melt and burn up.

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Any shallower, the vehicle will bounce off

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the atmosphere of Mars.

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At the very top of the atmosphere,

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gets about 70 miles above the surface of Mars,

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and the air is starting to get thicker

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and thicker and thicker.

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As it does that, the temperature on that heat shield

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gets well over 1,000 degrees Centigrade,

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enough to melt steel.

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Over the next two minutes, the vehicle decelerates

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from 13,000 miles an hour to about 1,000 miles an hour.

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At about 10 miles above the surface of Mars,

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a supersonic parachute is launched

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out of the back of the vehicle.

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Six pyrotechnic devices fire simultaneously,

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allowing the heat shield to fall

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and tumble away from the vehicle,

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exposing the lander to the surface of Mars.

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10 seconds after the heat shield is dropped,

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three pyro technically deployed legs

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are released and locked for landing.

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About a minute later, the landing radar is turned on

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sending pulses towards the surface of mars.

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As the vehicle starts to try to measure

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how high it is above the surface

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and how fast it's going,

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at about a mile above the surface of Mars,

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the lander falls away from the back shell

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and lights its entrance and very quickly,

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the vehicle must rotate out of the way

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so that the parachute and the back shell

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doesn't come down to hit it.

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The last thing that has to happen,

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is that on the moment of contact,

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the engines have to shut down immediately,

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if they don't, the vehicle will tip over.

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(orchestral music)

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If everything goes exactly according to plan,

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InSight will signal its successful landing

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to anxious humans back at JPL

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with a little bit of help from some nearby friends.

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There were two stowaways joining InSight

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on its trip to our neighboring planet,

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known as the Mars Cube One, or MarCO,

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these briefcase sized satellites

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will act as a communications relay

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between our planet and Mars.

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(intense orchestral music)

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They'll beam data from InSight back to the control room

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where team members will have to wait

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an agonizing eight additional minutes

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for the signal to arrive back to Earth.

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So we have two types of antennas on the InSight Lander

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that are used for communication.

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So, this one is an X-band antenna,

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there are two X-band antennas.

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These antennas communicate direct to Earth

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and receives the commands daily.

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After its solar arrays are deployed to power the craft,

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InSight will take pictures of the landing site

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so that engineers and scientists back home

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can formulate a detailed plan of attack.

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So there is one camera that's mounted underneath the deck,

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its got a fisheye view

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and gets area right where I'm standing

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in front of the workspace.

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The second camera is mounted on the forearm

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of the robotic arm and that sees anywhere we place the arm.

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The camera will also take three-dimensional stereo images

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of the workspace allowing scientists

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and engineers to select the best place

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to deploy the instruments.

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That data will then be used

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with an augmented reality headset

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that will provide holographic imagery

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to help accurately imitate the landing site.

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Seen here in red, the data from Mars

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is superimposed on the labs gravel sandbox

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and will then be shaped to resemble the area,

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helping the team find the best suitable location

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to employ the instrument.

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It will take InSight and the team on the ground

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two to three months to deploy the instruments on Mars

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after InSight lands.

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And while three months may seem like an awfully long time,

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in space exploration, patience is a virtue.

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Besides, it'll give the team back home

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plenty of time to catch their breath

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after InSights terrifying seven minute free fall.

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(light instrumental music)