{"id":19258,"date":"2016-09-02T22:36:01","date_gmt":"2016-09-02T14:36:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/nasa-gives-go-ahead-to-fix-mars-insight-landers-flaw-and-launch-it-in-2018\/"},"modified":"2016-09-02T22:36:01","modified_gmt":"2016-09-02T14:36:01","slug":"nasa-gives-go-ahead-to-fix-mars-insight-landers-flaw-and-launch-it-in-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/nasa-gives-go-ahead-to-fix-mars-insight-landers-flaw-and-launch-it-in-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"NASA gives go-ahead to fix Mars InSight lander\u2019s flaw and launch it in 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Mars
An artist\u2019s conception shows NASA\u2019s InSight lander on Mars. The SEIS instrument is in the chamber shown to the left of the lander platform. (Credit: NASA \/ JPL-Caltech)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

NASA has approved plans to fix a flaw on its InSight lander in time for a launch to Mars in 2018.<\/p>\n

The flaw involves a leak in a vacuum seal for one of the lander\u2019s main scientific instruments, known as the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure or SEIS. InSight had been scheduled for launch this year, but last December, NASA put off the launch because the leak couldn\u2019t be fixed in time.<\/p>\n

Today NASA said it would spend an extra $153.8 million, on top of the mission\u2019s previously budgeted $675 million, to redesign the instrument and cover other costs of the two-year delay.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe additional cost will not delay or cancel any current missions, though there may be fewer opportunities for new missions in future years, from fiscal years 2017 to 2020,\u201d NASA said in a statement.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=7ENWZR0-s1o<\/p>\n

NASA said it was targeting a 2018 launch back in March, but it wasn\u2019t until this week that the agency\u2019s Science Mission Directorate gave final approval for the revised mission plan.<\/p>\n

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory will be responsible for redesigning SEIS\u2019 vacuum container and the electrical connections that previously failed testing. Meanwhile, France\u2019s space agency, the Centre National d\u2019\u00c9tudes Spatiales, will focus on SEIS\u2019 sensors as well as integration of those sensors into the container, and the integration of the complete instrument into the lander.<\/p>\n

SEIS is meant to measure ground movements on Mars as small as half the radius of a hydrogen atom, but to do that, the instrument\u2019s seismic sensors have to be held in a perfect vacuum.<\/p>\n

\u201cInSight\u201d is a quasi-acronym, standing for Interior Exploration Using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport. The seismic instrument plays a key role in InSight\u2019s mission to study Mars\u2019 deep interior, where astrobiologists say any life on Mars stands the best chance of surviving.<\/p>\n

More broadly, data from InSight could shed light on the formation and evolution of rocky planets like Earth and Mars. \u201cWe\u2019ve concluded that a replanned InSight mission for launch in 2018 is the best approach to fulfill these long-sought, high-priority science objectives,\u201d said Jim Green, director of NASA\u2019s Planetary Science Division.<\/p>\n

The revised plan calls for InSight to be launched during a window that opens on May 5, 2018, with the Mars landing planned for Nov. 26 of that year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An artist\u2019s conception shows NASA\u2019s InSight lander on Mars. The SEIS instrument is in the chamber shown to the left of the lander platform. (Credit: NASA \/ JPL-Caltech) NASA has approved plans to fix a flaw on its InSight lander in time for a launch to Mars in 2018. The flaw involves a leak in a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[927,367,190],"class_list":["post-19258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-insight","tag-mars","tag-nasa"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19258"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19258"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19258\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}