InSight, NASA’s robotic lander, has successfully touched down on Mars. It has spent seven months traveling through space to reach the Red Planet. It notified the agency of its successful landing with a “beep” signal shortly after touching down to confirm that everything was as it should be. A photo of the Martian surface where it landed was sent back to Earth as well.
InSight stands for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport. It’s going to explore a part of the Mars planet that we don’t know much about yet. It’s on a two-year mission to look into the building blocks of the neighboring planet. It has traveled 301,223,981 miles through space to reach its destination after being launched on May 5th.
There was a lot of anticipation for this landing which was broadcast live on the Nasdaq Stock Market tower in Time Square, New York City. Millions of people from across the globe kept an eye on the rover’s progress as it approached Mars.
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said this is the eighth successful landing on Mars in human history. The InSight rover will be studying the interior of Mars and will provide valuable information which will be used in the preparations to send astronauts to Mars.