7 Minutes of Terror: The Challenges of Getting to Mars
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory5 HN recommenders · 2016–2021
3.2M views · documentary · evergreen · Uploaded 2012-06-22
NASA JPL engineers explain the final minutes of the Curiosity rover's entry, descent and landing on Mars, which combined aerobraking, a parachute and a skycrane. It lays out the tight sequence of events that all had to work automatically.
HN repeatedly recommends it as an awe-inspiring example of engineering problem solving and the go-to explainer on how Mars landings work.
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9 comments from Hacker News
Reminds of the "Seven Minutes of Terror" video that NASA put out ahead of the Curiosity landing explaining how they intended to make it safely to the surface. [VIDEO] (Note: I get goosebumps every time I watch this, absolutely amazing problem solving.)
Surprisingly the wheels only weigh a few pounds each! (I still can't think in metric and I don't have a real number.) They were primarily constrained by packing volume during cruise ( [LINK] ) and then by shock loads as the securing pyrobolts blew during landing ( [VIDEO] ).
There's a video showing the JWST deployment sequence. It's set to calm orchestral music, and the visuals are just 3D renters of the spacecraft. [LINK] This video makes me far more nervous than "7 Minutes of Terror", depicting Curiosity's entry/descent/landing sequence. Far more things have to go right in order for JWST to become operational. [VIDEO]
> I still haven't seen any case for visual programming. Aerodef, automotive, etc all use some form of visual programming. Controls engineers rarely write code, the systems are way too complex. E.g. I highly recommend watching this video from JPL to give you an understanding of where such tools excel. It's about simulating, iterating and then having scientists and engineers autogenerate the code they couldn't possibly write or test [VIDEO]
Yup. The robotic program has a very good track record of successes, even for crazy stuff like the Mars Science Laboratory’s sky crane descent stage: [VIDEO] It’s the human spaceflight program that has had the, um, difficulties. There are signs of hope, though.
Curiosity used aerobraking, parachutes AND a skycrane to land. There's a great video here: [VIDEO] Previous solutions weren't used because they were less crazy, but because they were more mass efficient for "small" payload sizes.
For perceiving the events happening, sure, that was my point. These time differences are nearly always imperceptible but at distances of planets it truly becomes a way of looking into the past. But to be clear, events happen concurrently, eg NASA knew _when_ relative to earth time and _perceived_ events, each stage was "happening" local to Mars vs Earth (assuming it all went well). They made videos about this "7 minutes of terror", I forgot the name of them but linking here [0] [0] [VIDEO]
JPL produced a video titled "7 minutes of terror" that detailed the landing procedure they used for Curiosity, and it's worth a watch. It goes into detail on everything you see in the articles landing video: [VIDEO]
If you have not watched the seven minutes of terror video produced by NASA, you absolutely must. It details exactly how they put these amazing machines on the surface of Mars. [VIDEO]