First picture of Mars from NASA’s Perseverance craft is here

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover has sent back its first image after a
successful landing on Mars on Thursday. The images come from the rover craft’s
Hazard Avoidance Cameras. The initial images, called ‘thumbnails’, have come
out primarily and are of lower-resolution due to the cameras being covered with
protective layers, with later pictures expected to be of comparatively higher-resolution.

In the image, a shadow of the rover is visible against the backdrop of
the Martian landscape, with a rough and rocky surface visible in the distance,
near the Jerezo crater located just north of the Red planet’s equator.

Also read: NASA’s ‘perseverance’ for researching Mars gets a smooth landing

With the “Touchdown confirmed” coming from operations lead Swati
Mohan on 3:55 pm ET, NASA’s jet propulsion laboratory in Pasadena erupted in cheer.

“Today proved once again that with the power of science and
American ingenuity, nothing is beyond the realm of possibility,” tweeted
US President Joe Biden, hailing the event as a historic one.

In the coming years, Perseverance will be collecting about 30 rock and
soil samples in sealed tubes to send back to Earth for analysis sometime in the
2030s.

Also read: NASA’s Perseverance rover lands on Mars

Roughly the size of an SUV, the spacecraft weighs a ton, and is
equipped with a seven-foot long robotic arm, nine cameras, two microphones, and
several instruments to carry out its exploration.