Featured Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Topics: NASA, Science, Space, Technology
Tom Earnshaw
It might look like a flying saucer that has crash landed on the surface of Mars but the truth is rather different from the science fiction wishes of those wishing humanity comes across alien life.
The images of the 'saucer' were caught by a NASA helicopter orbiting Mars, with experts on the technology used to snap it saying it looks 'otherworldly' even to science boffins like them.
But the truth of the matter is a bit closer to hope and nothing to do with little green men hiding behind rocks on the Red Planet.
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It was back in February 2021 that NASA landed its Perseverance rover on Mars, having been launched in to space the year before.
On the underneath of the rover was the so called Ingenuity Helicopter, with NASA scientists planning on it making five flights over planet for research on Earth's nearest planetary neighbour.
Ingenuity went further than planned though, with 72 flights in total recorded by the helicopter.
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In doing this, it also became the first aircraft to successfully complete a powered, controlled flight on another world. Bravo.
But before its final 72nd flight came to an end in January of this year, it was way back on its 26th journey over Mars that the rather alien looking wreckage was recorded.
During this journey, Ingenuity recorded 10 images in the 159 seconds it journeyed across Mars at a height of 1,181 feet.
It is in these images that the eye-opening crash landed object was recorded, looking like something from The Martin starring Matt Damon.
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Ian Clark, an engineer who worked on Perseverance’s parachute system, said at the time: "There’s definitely a sci-fi element to it.
"It exudes otherworldly, doesn’t it?”
In actual fact, the wreckage was a little closer to home for Ingenuity and Perseverance.
No, not the product of aliens. Instead, it is the landing capsule that protected both spacecraft as they plummeted to the surface of Mars.
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Images from the scene show the 70-foot-wide parachute of the capsule still attached to the vessel, which limited the impact it had when hitting the surface of Mars.
Around 1.3 miles from the surface the parachute and shell detached from the Perseverance rover. After this, a rocket-powered system called Skycrane took over, managing its descent to Mars with thrust.
When smashing in to the Martian surface, the capsule had been travelling at a whopping 78 miles per house, hence why it looks rather worse for wear with its integrity ruined and bits of spacecraft left lying away from the main hull.
"They say a picture’s worth 1,000 words, but it’s also worth an infinite amount of engineering understanding," Clark said.