InSight EDL, 26 Nov 2018 Options

[nprev]

Good morning from Los Angeles! Today at approximately 1954 GMT InSight will touch down in Elysium Planitia, and this is where we'll discuss all the events associated with that. NASA TV (link) will provide live coverage starting at 1900 GMT. Official status updates will be published here (link)

Here's a list of significant events (source: JPL). Times listed first are Earth-received US Pacific Standard Time (GMT-8):

11:40 a.m. PST (2:40 p.m. EST) — Separation from the cruise stage that carried the mission to Mars
11:41 a.m. PST (2:41 p.m. EST) — Turn to orient the spacecraft properly for atmospheric entry
11:47 a.m. PST (2:47 p.m. EST) — Atmospheric entry at about 12,300 mph (19,800 kph), beginning the entry, descent and landing phase
11:49 a.m. PST (2:49 p.m. EST) — Peak heating of the protective heat shield reaches about 2,700°F (about 1,500°C)
-15 seconds later — Peak deceleration, with the intense heating causing possible temporary dropouts in radio signals
11:51 a.m. PST (2:51 p.m. EST) — Parachute deployment
-15 seconds later — Separation from the heat shield
-10 seconds later — Deployment of the lander's three legs
11:52 a.m. PST (2:52 p.m. EST) — Activation of the radar that will sense the distance to the ground
11:53 a.m. PST (2:53 p.m. EST) — First acquisition of the radar signal
-20 seconds later — Separation from the back shell and parachute
-0.5 second later — The retrorockets, or descent engines, begin firing
-2.5 seconds later — Start of the "gravity turn" to get the lander into the proper orientation for landing
-22 seconds later — InSight begins slowing to a constant velocity (from 17 mph to a constant 5 mph, or from 27 kph to 8 kph) for its soft landing
11:54 a.m. PST (2:54 p.m. EST) — Expected touchdown on the surface of Mars
12:01 p.m. PST (3:01 p.m. EST) — "Beep" from InSight's X-band radio directly back to Earth, indicating InSight is alive and functioning on the surface of Mars
No earlier than 12:04 p.m. PST (3:04 p.m. EST), but possibly the next day — First image from InSight on the surface of Mars
No earlier than 5:35 p.m. PST (8:35 p.m. EST) — Confirmation from InSight via NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter that InSight's solar arrays have deployed


Get the peanuts ready, and let's land on Mars!

GO INSIGHT!!!

[Guest_Steve5304_*]

Yes, of course. Not till it's safe to do so, though (gotta let the landing dust settle) and there are other critical events of higher priority, particularly solar panel deployment.

looks similar to phoenix landing zone. pretty boring for images but wealthy in science

[nprev]

Forum note: Later on today or possibly tomorrow after the early critical deployments are carried out this thread will be closed and we'll open a new surface operations thread.

What a ride that was!!!!

[galileo]

Heres the link for the first picture from Insight:


https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/multimedia/ra...mission=insight

[MahFL]

First image up already!
https://mars.nasa.gov/insight-raw-images/su...0000_0106M_.PNG
The surface looks very smooth.

That was pretty quick, considering it's Sol 0.

[mcaplinger]

First image up already!

Huh. Crud on the dust cover is a lot clumpier looking than what we got on the MAHLI dust cover on MSL. Maybe more localized material from the different thruster configuration and camera placement.

[atomoid]

First image up already!
https://mars.nasa.gov/insight-raw-images/su...0000_0106M_.PNG
The surface looks very smooth.

..and seems to have broken the internet! pancake,pancake,pancake!!
https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/multimedia/raw-images/

[nprev]

NASA TV live coverage just ended, press brief at 1400 PST (2200 GMT).

[MahFL]

During the pre-landing briefings I did not hear anyone say an image might be sent back right after touchdown, did anyone else ?

[Phil Stooke]

"That was pretty quick, considering it's Sol 1"

No, actually it is Sol 0.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

First image also here:

https://mars.nasa.gov/resources/22159/insig...s/?site=insight

Phil

[akuo]

(The PNG file on the raw images site is not complete, the bottom of the image is missing.) Edit: it's fixed now

Complete image at least in Emily's article here (from twitter?) http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakda...has-landed.html

Congrats Insight Team!

[nprev]

During the pre-landing briefings I did not hear anyone say an image might be sent back right after touchdown, did anyone else ?

It was mentioned as a possibility in the timeline, but it was entirely dependent on the success of MarCO. By all accounts, they have performed brilliantly.

[Phil Stooke]

Working on the assumption that it's never too early to start analyzing images here on UMSF:



The small arrows outline a skid mark on the surface made as that rock was pushed by the thrusters, as also seen twice at the Phoenix site.

EDIT: Now I'm not certain that thing on the right is a footpad. There may be some more small rocks over there.

EDIT 2: no, looks like I was right first time.

Phil

[RoverDriver]

Huh. Crud on the dust cover is a lot clumpier looking than what we got on the MAHLI dust cover on MSL. Maybe more localized material from the different thruster configuration and camera placement.

That does not surprises me given the different position of the dust cover, mostly the distance to the ground. I would say it is quite similar to the first image we received from the FHAZ from Curiosity which would have a distance and positioning more similar to IS.

Paolo

[lyford]

Just got out of a work meeting, did I miss anything?