Mars InSight landing – as it happened: Nasa lander touches down on Red Planet
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Nasa has landed on the Martian surface, hoping to drill down into the mysteries of the red planet and the rest of our solar system.
The InSight lander arrived and immediately got to work trying to understand the secrets that lie beneath Mars, for the first time ever.
The landing itself went entirely smoothly, and exactly as engineers had hoped – but perhaps not expected – it to happen. Humanity only has a 40 per cent success rate getting to the Martian surface, where the harsh atmosphere and other difficulties mean landers crash and die more than they land and succeed.
The landing came at the end of a seven-month trip from Earth. And it has been many years in the planning, marking a new interest in journeying to our closest planet and the first time Nasa has arrived on Mars in six years.
Please allow a moment for the live blog to load.
Here's the scene inside Nasa's JPL, as engineers anxiously await updates.
Right about now, on Mars, InSight is initiating its entry, descent and landing (or EDL) sequence. All that way away, the cruise stage is separating from the InSight capsule itself. But we won't know if that's happened for another eight minutes or so, as the messages make their way to us.
And now that's happening down here on Earth. Nasa engineers are eagerly awaiting confirmation that everything has separated and the lander is headed for land.
The Marcos are doing a great job – they're both in the right line-up to send messages back to Earth as they go. That's great news, if only for the engineers whose nerves will be calmed by getting live information as the lander heads towards the surface.
Engineers have lost signal from InSight. But that's all good! It's just because it's switched to its own signal. Everything is going well so far! All the spacecraft are pointing in the right direction, organised as they should be, and communicating right as they should.
The next thing we're waiting for is: entry. When the lander hits the atmosphere, and everything starts getting hotter and more difficult. The atmosphere is a challenge – we don't want the lander to burn up with the friction – but it's also the thing that will allow InSight to float (hopefully) softly down to the surface.
Both MarCOs – the two little observant cubes that watch the landing and send updates back down to Earth – are doing great. Everything's as it should be and we'll receive live updates as the lander makes its way down.
Again we don't need that information – Nasa isn't driving the lander, and doesn't need live information – but it ensures we have the most up to date information if anything goes wrong. And we might even get a picture as it drops down.
InSight has entered the atmosphere!!!!!!
It's going to start getting very hot as the atmosphere slows it down and the friction gets the heat shield protecting the lander as hot as 1500C. It's protected by that big shield, which will keep the lander itself just a little hotter than room temperature.
If you were on Mars (like Elon Musk says he will soon be) you'd see a big, bright hot comet streaking across the sky, as the lander hits the atmosphere and sends a cloud around it.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments