The Insight lander on Mars as seen from orbit over six years
Click for movie.
Using photos taken by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) from 2018 to 2024, researchers have compiled a short movie showing how the dust around the Mars lander Insight changed over time.
This video shows images taken by HiRISE between Dec. 11, 2018, just a couple weeks after InSight landed on Mars, and Oct. 23, 2024. In the images, InSight often appears as a bright, blue dot due to its reflection of sunlight. A dark halo was scorched into the ground by the spacecraft’s retrorocket thrusters; this halo fades away over time. Dark stripes that can be seen on the surface are tracks left by passing dust devils. [emphasis mine]
You can see the movie here. The image to the right was the first picture taken by MRO only three weeks after landing.
Insight eventually shut down because this dust accumulated on its solar panels, and the lander never was blessed with having a dust devil cross over it to blow that dust away. This video illustrates why. Out of the seven images making up the short movie, only three show dust devil tracks, and in each case only a few tracks are seen. No other tracks are detected.
In other words, over six years this region simply did not get a lot of dust devils. The odds of one crossing over InSight was thus quite low. Ironically, the image to the right shows that a dust devil crossed very close to the lander about the time it landed in 2018, probably just beforehand since the dark scorch created by the lander’s thrusters cover the track. No dust devil ever got that close again.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Click for movie.
Using photos taken by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) from 2018 to 2024, researchers have compiled a short movie showing how the dust around the Mars lander Insight changed over time.
This video shows images taken by HiRISE between Dec. 11, 2018, just a couple weeks after InSight landed on Mars, and Oct. 23, 2024. In the images, InSight often appears as a bright, blue dot due to its reflection of sunlight. A dark halo was scorched into the ground by the spacecraft’s retrorocket thrusters; this halo fades away over time. Dark stripes that can be seen on the surface are tracks left by passing dust devils. [emphasis mine]
You can see the movie here. The image to the right was the first picture taken by MRO only three weeks after landing.
Insight eventually shut down because this dust accumulated on its solar panels, and the lander never was blessed with having a dust devil cross over it to blow that dust away. This video illustrates why. Out of the seven images making up the short movie, only three show dust devil tracks, and in each case only a few tracks are seen. No other tracks are detected.
In other words, over six years this region simply did not get a lot of dust devils. The odds of one crossing over InSight was thus quite low. Ironically, the image to the right shows that a dust devil crossed very close to the lander about the time it landed in 2018, probably just beforehand since the dark scorch created by the lander’s thrusters cover the track. No dust devil ever got that close again.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Tough break.
But even with the dust buildup on the solar arrays, Insight still managed to last twice as long as its intended operational mission lifespan (2 years).