inside this rocket is the rover that
could find
life on mars if it lands
we've got to go from thousands of miles
an hour
to zero
[Music]
and not do a bug on a windshield the new
rover is called
perseverance perseverance is the
most sophisticated piece of robotic
hardware
ever launched off of the earth it will
search
mars for signs of life while smithsonian
scientists
roam the earth for reference the search
for life is one of the biggest
questions humans have previous rovers
set the stage
now perseverance could reset our view of
the universe
we're going to get one shot at this meet
the rocket
the rover and the helicopter that could
change
how we explore mars and beyond
it's all riding on perseverance
february 18 2021
the sky is orange
under bright sunshine it's minus 80
degrees
fahrenheit the eight-year-old
curiosity rover dutifully carries on
otherwise mars is quiet as a desert
but here comes the new kid on the block
after seven months of smooth sailing
through space
the bumpy ride begins
as the spacecraft encounters the upper
part of the atmosphere it will heat up
once it slows down enough then the heat
shield will come off
and we will deploy a parachute
but we're still literally hurtling
towards the surface
even after being on that parachute for
ways
remember this is a car sized object that
weighs
almost a ton no human
steers it but it has just seven minutes
to thread the needle or this next
martian explorer
will crash and burn
meet perseverance our newest mars rover
it's a huge beast of machine and it is
chock full of scientific instruments
that are going to explore the surface of
mars
at nasa's jet propulsion laboratory in
california
perseverance comes together in a clean
room
if it's going to find life it can't
bring any life with it
it's really important to make sure that
we send a clean rover to mars because
if we do find something on mars we have
to make sure
it's something that actually came from
mars and not something that hitched a
ride
they're building the most complex rover
ever
including 23 different cameras
mast cam z mimics human eyesight by
capturing
stereo panoramas a chemistry cam on the
robotic arm
can zero in on the tiniest fragment
and for the first time ever video
cameras will record the rover's descent
and landing from four angles
so with perseverance for the first time
we effectively have the
opportunity to make movies
some of these cameras reach 5k
resolution
that will beat the pixels off of
this
prior to 1965 the best views of mars
came from earth-based telescopes
we really had no idea of what the
detailed surface of mars looked like
in the absence of data humans dreamed
we had centuries to conjure up ideas
about mars
some scientific some silly
the popular view of mars is that it did
have life
there were aliens on it you know you
have this entire sci-fi
industry built upon that you speak
wisely
i will go nothing said martian fantasy
quite like little green men i know
i don't think he'll be causing any more
trouble creative minds careened out of
control
until july 14
1965 earthlings in california
anxiously await a signal from their
latest attempt to reach mars
the first two spacecraft failed
but mariner 4 has a shot
[Music]
it was intended to take a few pictures
of the surface as it flew by after a
seven month journey
mariner 4 has less than 30 minutes to
get the first close-ups of mars
the idea that you're going to see
something for the very first time
if it works is not only cause for
tremendous
excitement but also tremendous
trepidation will it work
images come in as data taking six
hours per picture
[Music]
finally the printer comes to life
[Music]
but mars looks dead
the initial reaction was oh my gosh it
looks like the moon
it was just this sort of dry desolate
cratered surface
and i think that that kind of punched a
hole in the whole
you know romantic idea that there were
martians
mariner 4 snaps just 22 photos as it
blows by mars
but they rock our little corner of the
cosmos
that was an enormous surprise and
the beginning of our understanding that
mars is not
the mars of science fiction but i think
as a geologist it's an even better place
with all of these amazing things to look
at
[Music]
with each mission mars comes into better
focus
[Music]
mariner 6 takes 75 photos
mariner 7 snaps 126.
then our first orbiter mariner 9
circles mars for nearly a year and takes
more than 7
000 shots mars was sort of
unveiled globally for the first time to
human eyes
now we see more than just craters we see
canyons
and what looked like dry riverbeds
there were clearly branching systems
of channels that were merging in a
downhill direction
and of course the most likely and
logical
origin for those was by running water
mariner 9 doesn't reveal when or why the
water disappeared
but it jolts us toward a new theory
maybe mars isn't like the moon
maybe it used to be more like
earth
[Music]
smithsonian scientist ross irwin studies
how water can shape a planet
and possibly spark life
about three and a half billion years ago
mars had many rivers on its surface
which were about this size
and carved valleys about the size of the
one behind me
when the mariner 9 spacecraft arrived at
mars it was a surprise to see these
river valleys all over the place
subsequent missions revealed other
earth-like features
in some cases we have alluvial fans
where erosion of a mountain front has
deposited sediment and a fan
out across the floor of a basin and then
we also have deltas
and just like river deltas that you see
here on the earth these
river deltas on mars represent deposits
of
sediment out into a standing water
all of these eroded river valleys and
sedimentary deposits were compelling
evidence
of flowing water on the surface of mars
but it left a lot of unanswered
questions
how long was the water there were these
environments really favorable
for the origin and persistence
of life
if ancient mars had surface water long
enough it may have supported life
and left evidence just like on earth
this type of rock is very good for
preserving evidence of
past habitability so it's not just
indications
that this environment may have been
suitable for life but it's also very
good at preserving
evidence left behind by life itself
obviously on mars we're not looking for
fossils
but we're looking for indications of
whether there was
bacteria on the surface of mars
during these wetter periods early in its
history the only way to look
that closely at mars was to get on the
ground
mariner 4 did a drive-by
mariner 9 kept circling around the block
then viking opened the door
[Music]
the anticipation for these missions was
very high
these landers were going to soft land on
the surface and actually look for
evidence of life
in the surface materials of mars
in 1976 viking skids into the martian
atmosphere
it will either make history or crash
violently
building perseverance to operate
successfully on mars
is one challenge getting it to mars
is another about every two years
the orbits of earth and mars put them in
the same
general neighborhood but still millions
of miles apart
mars is really far away and getting the
spacecraft there to a specific point
is something that requires incredible
time
and attention to detail to make sure
happens correctly
we did it incorrectly plenty of times
in the very early days we had mishaps on
the launch pad
we had spacecraft fail to achieve orbit
we've had spacecraft
a hard impact on the surface we
miscalculated trajectories
we've had spacecraft that have had
various
hardware problems the last i heard there
was that there was
some funny business in the first 10
picture recording
getting to mars is very very hard
enter viking america's first attempt
to land on mars with viking
there was very much of an element of a
mission into the unknown
nasa launches two viking landers hoping
that at least one
land safely the huge amount is at stake
if you don't land safely you don't get
any science
on july 20 1976 viking 1
begins the landing sequence it's too far
away to control
in real time
viking is on its own
famed astronomer carl sagan joins the
mission team
for the nervous moment it's his first
taste of the seven minutes of terror
there's this period of time that the
spacecraft has
to go through on its own
[Music]
to land on the surface safely
that process takes about seven minutes
from the time it hits the top of mars
atmosphere
until wheels down on the surface so we
call that the seven minutes of terror
feet per second come on acs is close to
vertical
nav
signals from the surface
oh my gosh i think landing on mars for
the first time
i mean it's just the most thrilling and
exciting thing that you could imagine i
mean landing on another planet and then
having it
open up and get your first image of a
place that
no human has ever seen
july 20th turned on the tv and there was
a picture of mars from the surface
and it didn't look at all like what i
would have guessed
it looked like being in the desert
southwest of the u.s
people could really relate to what they
were seeing on the surface of mars i
think for the very first time because
it was sort of like you were standing
there
viking 2 lands a few months later
neither lander finds existing life or
standing water
but they begin a new era of space
exploration
we had landed on another planet and that
view i
will be forever in the textbooks the
landers send back
mountains of data but they can't move
they were fixed in one place on the
surface and there's always this sort of
what if we could just get to that rock
over there
viking was ground breaking but it wasn't
path finding and so i think that there's
this natural progression
to want to build mobility in the form of
a rover
into a subsequent mission that allows us
to answer those questions
20 years after the viking missions nasa
embarks on a remarkable test drive
so sojourner was a very little rover it
was basically a microwave on wheels if
you think about something
along a sort of size comparison
it's named after civil and women's
rights pioneer
sojourner truth and it hopes to pioneer
a new way
to explore mars
it was primarily designed to be a
demonstration that we could
send a rover to another planet and have
it operate successfully
it's tucked inside a lander called
pathfinder
100 green board and both rock it off to
try to make
history main engines start one zero
and liftoff of the delta rocket was mars
pathfinder
separation after landing and waking up
the spacecraft rolls out the first
martian rover we have imaging data
even though it never ventures more than
40 feet from the lander
sojourner makes the first tracks on mars
in 1997.
this is a game changer sojourner was
kind of a turning point in mars
exploration because
until that point i hadn't personally
fully appreciated
what mobility could get for you mobility
is now the main focus
[Music]
the new rover perseverance practices her
moves in what nasa calls
the mars yard
[Applause]
so we're here in the mars yard and this
is where uh our rovers practice
uh driving over rocky terrain to make
sure that we can get the best science
possible on mars and go to the most
exciting places we can we can get to
with the rover
[Music]
each wheel has an independent motor and
cleats for traction
in the fine martian sand legs are made
of titanium
the same lightweight metal used in the
best bicycles
perseverance has to be strong and nimble
if it's going to break new ground
often the most exciting geology outcrops
that we want to study on mars
are often the most challenging to go to
but it will not
go fast top speed is less than 0.1 miles
per hour
interplanetary driving is a cautious
business
we're not talking about daytona speedway
in terms of their moving around
but what it lacks in speed it has in
scientific
bling perseverance is the
most sophisticated piece of robotic
hardware ever
launched off of the earth it has a seven
foot long robotic arm
to reach out and analyze the terrain
lasers to see different wavelengths
spectrometers to identify different
compounds
it's a weather station rockhound and
chemistry lab
all of it is designed to finally answer
humanity's biggest question
[Music]
are we unique in the universe
perseverance is the first rover that
really has the capability
to get in and maybe help answer that
question of whether there was ever life
on mars
the search began with viking
continued with pathfinder and sojourner
but bigger could be better
nasa starts work on twin rovers that
dwarf sojourner
spirit and opportunity are a bold
gamble
the new mars rover perseverance is in
final assembly
scientists can't wait to unleash it on
the martian surface
my job is to oversee the science that
the rover will do
once it gets to the surface of mars to
get that science
mission planners hope it rolls for at
least two earth years
and covers at least 12 miles
[Music]
by contrast our 20th century martian
explorers didn't explore
very far
sojourner didn't venture more than 15
yards from the landing spot
it's as if a martian spacecraft landed
in your backyard
and only got as far as the fence
[Music]
but in 2004 twin rovers take off
so the mars exploration rover's spirit
and opportunity
really became that next step we wanted
to follow the water we want to
understand the role of water
in shaping the landscape of mars
spirit and opportunity visit ancient
riverbeds for the first close-up look
at what water left behind this time
with hands-on tools
these guys are about the size of a golf
cart at this point and
so they're bigger and they're built as
sort of field geologists
robotic field geologists on mars
both rovers roll for miles and the alien
landscape
starts looking familiar
and we started seeing rocks that had
ripple marks formed in them
ripple marks much like you might see in
a riverbed where the water is flowing
and transporting
sand across the surface you know you can
walk out your door and go to the local
pond and see those same kinds of
features
the mission rolls beyond expectations
and seems to have a bit of luck
when a wheel fails spirit accidentally
scrapes up a layer of the red sand
revealing white
so this bright white material that turns
out to be almost pure silica tells us
that it was probably precipitated from
relatively hot water
in a volcanic area then spirit stumbles
upon
another wild discovery
[Music]
it beams home a series of images that
could pass for
oklahoma dust devils direct evidence
of martian wind
then a mars orbiter captures a dust
devil rising a half
mile high casting a shadow across the
landscape
we know that on earth wind can be a
shape shifter
smithsonian's mariah baker is an expert
at recognizing its handiwork when you go
to a desert or a beach like this you can
see that wind is constantly sculpting
the landscape
when wind blows over a sandy surface it
can cause ripples to form
or dunes like these
on mars wind does exactly the same thing
in fact it's been the dominant geologic
force for billions of years since all
the water dried up
researchers like me can go to some of
the most mars-like places on earth
like the great sand dunes in colorado
and the atacama desert in chile
to understand how surface features form
on mars
but at some point the similarities break
down and the mysteries begin
so in this dune we can see what are
known as impact ripples which are the
smallest surface
features formed by wind the smallest
impact triples that we see are formed in
fine sand
but larger coarse sand forms these
larger wavelength ripples
and when we arrived at mars and we saw
that these large ripples were also
forming in just fine material
we realized that we didn't quite
understand how they form entirely
this is where mars gets alien
on mars we've got about a third of the
gravity that we have
here on earth which makes sand a little
bit easier to move
however we also have an atmosphere
that's about 100 times
less dense than the atmosphere here on
earth which means that a 40 mile per
hour wind
might feel like just a breeze on our
skin and so we need much higher wind
speeds to actually move sand on the
surface
but somehow martian winds can still whip
the entire planet into a frenzy
every year mars throws a few dust storms
that last for weeks
but stay local on occasion
one of them goes global when you have
these
occasional global dust storms it can
basically kick up dust into the entire
atmosphere it completely obscures the
surface
in 2018 the sharp features of mars
disappear
in just a few months as a thick red
cloud
envelops the planet the rover
opportunity is now almost
15 years old and has driven more than 28
miles
but a big storm is coming
looking down it sees dust accumulating
on its solar panels
looking up it sees less and less
and suddenly the sky literally darkens
over the course of a period of just a
few short days
and the last image we have looking
towards the sun from opportunity
effectively shows us in being in
darkness
the dust storm blocked out all sun light
from reaching the solar panels
14 we're project manager 14.
for eight months opportunity's mission
team sends ping after ping
to try to wake up the teenage rover one
spacecraft id
253 it never
never did power on again to call home
finally nasa concedes and this is
section 14 on behalf of the
network that's a sad day for all of us
her project off the net thank you
because opportunity was operating for 14
and a half years people got very
attached to the rover
and i can tell you that the people who
were on those um
conference calls when we decided to end
the mission were
very sad opportunity broke the mold for
rover longevity
perseverance is designed to be even
stronger
the first thing the rover has to survive
of course is all the testing we do to it
they run perseverance through everything
mars could throw at it
severe temperature swings down to 200
below zero fahrenheit
blowing dust that could grind gears and
blind cameras
but at least not cut power
perseverance is nuclear power we don't
have to worry about dust storms
it's called radio power essentially a
nuclear battery
it converts the heat from the decay of
plutonium into electricity
it could power perseverance for years
if it survives the journey you design a
rover for the sort of worst case
scenario
the worst case shaking on launch the
worst case
hard landing all have to be survived
if perseverance lands safely it will see
more than what's on the surface of mars
it will take a peek underground at
layers of history
on earth we see these layers at the most
unlikely places
when we do geology on the earth we often
get fortunate enough to have a road cut
like this
from building a highway and that road
cut allows us to see the layers that
have built up over time
now in a lot of cases on mars we're not
going to be able to get some kind of
cross cut through the terrain like this
and what we have to do is use a remote
sensing instrument
called ground penetrating radar
i work on an instrument called charade
the shallow radar on the mars
reconnaissance orbiter
shrod transmits signals and that pulse
will travel down
through a layer like this and each time
that signal bounces back to us we build
up a cross section
just like you see in the road cut here
in order to tell the geologic history of
that area
they might be differences between sand
layers and ice in the polar caps
but there's no substitute for being able
to look in greater detail at what's
right below your feet
the perseverance rover will carry an
instrument called rimfacts
which will measure the subsurface layers
beneath the rover
down to a shallower depth than charade
perhaps 10 meters
but with much finer detail now someday
astronauts may be able to simply walk up
to an area like this on mars
and make observations of the geologic
history through the layering
but for the time being instruments like
charade and rimfax are invaluable
perseverance is the first rover that can
see underground
[Applause]
but it also carries something that could
see over the horizon
[Music]
at nasa's jet propulsion laboratory in
california
perseverance has passed all of its
flight tests
it's a month away from leaving home
it's built on the legacy of the rover
that came
just before it after the spirit and
opportunity mars exploration rovers
curiosity became sort of the big sister
on the block
in 2012 curiosity became the next rover
in line for mars
it's a major upgrade so it's about the
size of a small suv
in terms of its complexity and its size
it's just far beyond what we've uh what
we've done before
all around the country curiosity sparks
mars mania
on landing day curiosity creates a buzz
in new york city at nasa
it creates a roar
[Applause]
the biggest rover yet is safely on mars
[Applause]
it lands inside a fascinating landscape
gale crater i think really is the place
on mars where
you feel like you are on earth
there's evidence that curiosity has
collected that there was a liquid water
lake
inside this crater if you had been
standing there you would have been
knee-deep in running water
and it would have been drinkable i mean
you could you could take a cup and scoop
it
and drink it curiosity drills into this
ancient
lake bed finding thick layers of
sediment that took
thousands of years to build up for me
that was a real aha moment because
suddenly here i was
staring in the face sediments that were
very much like the sediments that were
being deposited
in the lake where i grew up in northern
new york
[Music]
and i was kind of dragged kicking and
screaming into this idea
but by god there was an ancient lake on
mars and it was there for a good long
time
we now think water flowed on the surface
for up to a billion years
but dissipated about three billion years
ago
the reason that the water became less
stable on the surface is that the
atmosphere
changed and became very thin eventually
it became very dry and cold
perseverance will look at what water
left behind
especially in craters perseverance is
landing in a place called jezero crater
where we see because of an inlet channel
and an outlet channel
that water once filled that up and
overflowed
perseverance is going to go and evaluate
those sediments and those rocks
seeking signs of life the search begins
with the rover's
amazing arm so i would say the robotic
arm
is incredibly important for the mission
because it has everything on its hand
and in fact as i'm talking to you you
can see me moving my arm because
it is so intuitive also
you're thinking about an arm just like
yours on arm where the fingers are the
instruments
and you immediately can picture exactly
what you will do
if you were a geologist standing on the
surface of mars bring it down put it
here let me see it
at the end of the arm is a whole new
suite of instruments
that will look for traces of past life
the robotic arm also has a drill in it
which is the actual unit
that will collect the sample a drill on
a rover
is old news but the fate of the sample
could be big news
perseverance is going to collect and
cash samples
for possible return to earth at some
time in the future
this rover will begin the most ambitious
robotic space handoff
ever attempted perseverance
will drill down and collect samples and
put them in an area
where a second rover can come in the
future and pick them up
they'll be put inside a small rocket
that will be launched up into orbit will
be captured
and eventually return to earth at some
time in the future
[Music]
if perseverance finds evidence of life
we'll need the sample on earth to
confirm it
within a decade we could be holding the
first evidence of
alien life in our hands the kind of holy
grail is sample return
and perseverance is the first step along
that path
packed inside perseverance is another
space first
it looks like a spider learning to fly
[Music]
but it's the first interplanetary
helicopter
ingenuity which is the helicopter that
we're sending to ride along with
perseverance rover is designed as a
technology demonstration to for the very
first time
show that we can operate a powered
flight
aerial vehicle on the surface of mars
nasa creates a chamber simulating the
atmosphere of mars
where liftoff will be 100 times harder
than on earth
with the atmosphere so thin there's very
little
material for the blades to push against
so it's it's very light and the blades
are very large in order to get enough
lift to be able to lift off the ground
the copter passes the test on earth
on mars it will have to fly solo because
radio signals take an average of 15
minutes
to travel between earth and mars
[Music]
it has to be done completely remotely
you have to be doing it
without any real sort of real-time
joystick control
of where this thing is going to go
if it works ingenuity could scout ahead
for perseverance
take detailed photos and transmit them
back to the rover
for a sneak peek of where it might go
all while flying into the history books
as the first
powered flight of an aircraft on another
planet
but it has to get off this planet first
the first step to mars is a
cross-country trip from
california to florida 16
semis truck in pieces of the capsule
that will carry perseverance to mars
those can all be sent separately but the
rover itself
fully assembled was sent on a large
airplane
to cape kennedy
at the launch site in florida they tuck
perseverance into the capsule
cradle it into the top stage of the
rocket and
worry you're in a situation
where you've got years and years of work
wrapped up
folded origami style almost on the top
of a giant
bomb
[Music]
and this thing goes bang and flies off
into the distance and it does so in a
real hurry
[Music]
and so there's a lot of personal fear
that what happens if something goes
wrong
launch day awaits
just as the new mars rover prepares to
launch off the earth
earth suffers a devastating blow
the rover is perfectly named as
perseverance because
getting this rover to the launch pad
occurred during a global pandemic
[Music]
it's hard enough to get a rover built on
time and with no mistakes in it
and you layer on a global pandemic you
know there's an extreme amount of stress
and you know pressure
[Music]
if something delays the launch mars
won't line up this closely to the earth
for another two years
we're gonna get one shot at this
[Music]
perseverance will ride on an atlas v
rocket
the boosters come from alabama the
payload adapter comes from texas
and the physics come from experience
it's not easy to hit a moving target at
a cosmic distance
the navigation people are trying to do
this 100 million mile hole in one
the spacecraft is actually put to a
place where mars is going to be
so think about a quarterback throwing a
long bomb downfield
even though the receiver is still 20 30
yards away from where he's going to
catch the ball
and knowing that the two are going to
come together at that last second at
just the right time
what a beautiful morning here on the
space coast
welcome everyone behind us the star of
the show
after years of work the moments before
launch
are like a vacuum currently working no
issues on the range or the
launch vehicle here's be ready to
proceed
they have a lot of their lives invested
in these things
it's as if your child is leaving home
[Music]
that is literally what is happening
it's just in this case the child is a
robot that is going to another planet
go atlas go
[Music]
the perseverance of humanity launching
the next generation of robotic explorers
to the red planet
barely 30 seconds in it breaks the sound
barrier
and mach 1 atlas 5 is now supersonic
90 miles up the solid rocket boosters
peel off
and we have a good indication of srb
jettison of all four srbs
just four and a half minutes in the
rocket drops back
and we have good indication of atlas
centaur separation
perseverance puts earth in the rear view
mirror
to have watched this rover launch to
to mars was an incredible feat
successful separation of mars 2020 with
the perseverance rover
there we go awesome now it enters the
cruise phase
six months of silent sailing that will
end
with a terrifying seven-minute leap of
faith
when the spacecraft gets to mars it's
literally going thousands of miles
an hour and so we've got to go
from thousands of miles an hour
to zero
and not do a bug on a windshield
the heavier the spacecraft the harder it
is to slow it down
viking was light enough to land with a
parachute and some retro rockets
the heavier spirit and opportunity
rovers needed
giant balloons to cushion their impact
now one ton perseverance will take a far
trickier path
as the spacecraft encounters the upper
part of the atmosphere will heat up
once it slows down enough then the heat
shield will come off
once we've slowed down enough on the
parachute then the
rover will separate from the back shell
that's when the engines on the descent
stage will actually ignite
and slow us down to eventually hovering
over the surface
the rover itself will actually be gently
lowered
spooled on cables
once the wheels touch the ground the
cables are cut
and the descent stage flies away
and then we have a rover on the surface
of mars
if it lands safely perseverance could
provide the first evidence that mars
supported life
but it will also ask could mars support
us it can be
minus 200 degrees fahrenheit it can be
windy
can be dusty so it's a pretty tough
place
to exist
one experiment on perseverance called
moxie
could set the stage for future
astronauts
the moxie instrument is going to take
carbon dioxide
out of mars atmosphere strip out oxygen
from those carbon dioxide molecules so
the instrument will be generating
oxygen with the materials already
present on mars maybe future astronauts
could breathe
oxygen mined from the atmosphere
maybe they could draw water from the ice
underground
and grow food inside their mars base
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perseverance is blazing the trail for it
all
i think all of us hope eventually humans
will get there well that's just the
latest
evolution of doing things on other
planets
humans could be off doing scientific
discovery and robots could be left to do
some of the
mundane housekeeping the creating of the
resources needed to survive
robots are great but again i think they
can only tell you so much
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personally i think we should go
a family photo of mars rovers reveals
generations of explorers
with perseverance at the cutting edge
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one day humans might launch in their
wake
and an astronaut could make the first
footprint
but she might look out and see what made
her footprint
possible miles and miles
of rover tracks