NASA Mars Insight Lander Prepared for Launch
Liftoff Scheduled for May 5th. Landing November 2018.
Mars will make its closest approach to Earth since 2003 on July 27th.

At Space Launch Complex 3 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, a crane is used to lift NASA's Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, or InSight, Mars lander for mating atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. InSight will be the first mission to look deep beneath the Martian surface. It will study the planet's interior by measuring its heat output and listen for marsquakes. The spacecraft will use the seismic waves generated by marsquakes to develop a map of the planet’s deep interior. The resulting insight into Mars’ formation will provide a better understanding of how other rocky planets, including Earth, were created. InSight is scheduled for liftoff May 5, 2018.

For more about the mission, visit: https://mars.nasa.gov/insight

Credit: USAF 30th Space Wing
Image Date: April 23, 2018

+Lockheed Martin
+NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
+DLR, German Aerospace Center
+Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR)
+NASA Solar System Exploration
+United Launch Alliance
+AFOSR, Air Force Office of Scientific Research

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InSight Mars Lander Solar Array Testing | NASA
NASA's InSight, the Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, is more than a Mars mission—it is a terrestrial planet explorer that will address one of the most fundamental issues of planetary and solar system science—understanding the processes that shaped the rocky planets of the inner solar system (including Earth) more than four billion years ago.

InSight, the first planetary mission to take off from the West Coast, is targeted to launch Saturday, May 5 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California aboard a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket.

In this Jan. 23, 2018 photo, InSight is in the landed configuration for the last time before arriving on Mars. Scientists commanded to deploy its solar arrays, to test and verify the exact process that the spacecraft will use on the surface of the Red Planet. During the test, engineers and technicians evaluated whether the solar arrays fully deployed and conducted an illumination test to confirm that the solar cells were collecting power.

Image Credit: Lockheed Martin Space
Image Date: January 23, 2018
Release Date: May 1, 2018

+Lockheed Martin
+NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
+DLR, German Aerospace Center +Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR)
+NASA Solar System Exploration
+United Launch Alliance

#NASA #Mars #Astronomy #Space #Science #Insight #Robotics #Technology #RedPlanet #STEM #Education #UnitedStates #JPL #Pasadena #California #DLR #Germany #Deutschland #LockheedMartin #JourneyToMars

NASA Mars InSight Mission Overview | JPL
NASA's next mission to Mars launches in May 2018. InSight is more than a Mars mission. Its team members hope to unlock the mysteries of the formation and evolution of rocky planets, including Earth.

For more about the mission, visit: https://mars.nasa.gov/insight

Credit: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Duration: 2 minutes, 31 seconds
Release Date: March 29, 2018

+NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
+DLR, German Aerospace Center
+Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR)
+NASA Solar System Exploration

#NASA #Mars #Astronomy #Space #Science #Insight #Robotics #Technology #RedPlanet #STEM #Education #UnitedStates #JPL #Pasadena #California #DLR #Germany #Deutschland #JourneyToMars #HD #Video

#Insight & #Information @allaboutjazz @MikeKennedytele LANDFALL here: https://www.allaboutjazz.com/landfall-mike-kennedy-self-produced-review-by-doug-collette.php

+NASA
+NASA's Kennedy Space Center
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