2 ms·
I wanted to know a little more detail about why the broad equatorial plain Elysium Planitia was chosen as the landing place. Found this article but just curious
by radium3d 8y ago
I wanted to know a little more detail about why the broad equatorial plain Elysium Planitia was chosen as the landing place. Found this article but just curious if there is any more detail about the location or selection process?
--
Elysium Planitia, a flat-smooth plain just north of the equator makes for the perfect location from which to study the deep Martian interior.
Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, or InSight, is designed to study the deep interior of Mars. The mission seeks the fingerprints of the processes that formed the rocky planets of the solar system.
Its landing site, Elysium Planitia, was picked from 22 candidates, and is centered at about 4.5 degrees north latitude and 135.9 degrees east longitude; about 373 miles (600 kilometers) from Curiosity’s landing site, Gale Crater. The locations of other Mars landers and rovers are labeled.
InSight's scientific success and safe landing depends on landing in a relatively flat area, with an elevation low enough to have sufficient atmosphere above the site for a safe landing. It also depends on landing in an area where rocks are few in number. Elysium Planitia has just the right surface for the instruments to be able to probe the deep interior, and its proximity to the equator ensures that the solar-powered lander is exposed to plenty of sunlight.
--
https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/jpl/pia22232/insight-s-landing-site-elysium-planitia https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/jpl/pia22232/insight-s-la...
- dandelany 8y agoHere’s the paper they published about landing site selection (7.5MB PDF): https://spiral.imperial.ac.uk:8443/bitstream/10044/1/48751/2/SPAC321_Author.pdf https://spiral.imperial.ac.uk:8443/bitstream/10044/1/48751/2... Table 3 on page 20 of the PDF is a good summary; their main constraints were latitude, elevation, slope (flatness) and rock abundance.