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What it sounds like when Perseverance moves

NASA has released audio recorded by one of Perseverance’s microphones as the rover completed one of its earliest drives.

NASA released two versions of the audio — one 90-second file edited and processed to filter out background noise, and another 16-minute clip with raw, unfiltered sound.

…Perseverance recorded the sounds during a 90-foot (27.3-meter) drive March 7, according to NASA. The rover’s top speed is a little less than 0.1 mph, or about 152 meters per hour.

The longer, raw audio clip includes a high-pitched scratching noise. The origin of the sound remains a mystery. “Perseverance’s engineering team continues to evaluate the source of the scratching noise, which may either be electromagnetic interference from one of the rover’s electronics boxes or interactions between the mobility system and the Martian surface,” NASA said in a statement. “The EDL microphone was not intended for surface operations and had limited testing in this configuration before launch.”

You can hear the recordings at the link.

In addition, the science team has picked the location where Perseverance will deploy the Ingenuity helicopter. A briefing will be held next week on March 23rd to outline the schedule for its test flight, now set for sometime in early April.

Genesis cover

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 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.


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"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

3 comments

  • eddie willers

    I’m kind of amazed that this is the first time anyone thought to add a microphone on a rover.

  • Skunk Bucket

    I’m guessing that most of the sound is coming through the structure of the rover, considering how thin the atmosphere is.

  • Col Beausabre

    From the press release

    “If I heard these sounds driving my car, I’d pull over and call for a tow,” said Dave Gruel, lead engineer for Mars 2020’s EDL Camera and Microphone subsystem. “But if you take a minute to consider what you’re hearing and where it was recorded, it makes perfect sense.”

    Perseverance recorded the sounds during a 90-foot (27.3-meter) drive March 7, according to NASA. The rover’s top speed is a little less than 0.1 mph, or about 152 meters per hour.

    The longer, raw audio clip includes a high-pitched scratching noise. The origin of the sound remains a mystery.

    “Perseverance’s engineering team continues to evaluate the source of the scratching noise, which may either be electromagnetic interference from one of the rover’s electronics boxes or interactions between the mobility system and the Martian surface,” NASA said in a statement. “The EDL microphone was not intended for surface operations and had limited testing in this configuration before launch.”

    Sounds travel much differently on Mars than on Earth. The Martian atmosphere is less than 1 percent the thickness of Earth’s atmosphere at sea level, and is primarily made up of carbon dioxide, not nitrogen and oxygen.”

    Darn, I expected to hear “Greetings, Earthling”

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