Skip to main content

NASA lets you meet its Mars rover and helicopter here on Earth

NASA is offering space fans the chance to come face to face with full-scale models of its trailblazing Mars Perseverance rover and Ingenuity helicopter.

The space agency is taking the models on a museum tour across the U.S. from the end of this month as part of its new Roving with Perseverance roadshow.

Recommended Videos

“As big as a car, with its camera ‘head’ rising high, Perseverance’s six-wheeled lookalike towers over most visitors, while Ingenuity’s double highlights just how small the history-making rotorcraft is,” NASA said in a message announcing the roadshow.

Please enable Javascript to view this content

🤖🚁 Come one, come all! The #MarsRoverTour kicks off Oct. 30 & some venues feature in-person/virtual talks, interactive exhibits and more. Models of @NASAPersevere & #MarsHelicopter are heading out to museums across the country.

See the full schedule: https://t.co/kiSmBXA9zO pic.twitter.com/SdNaT3mLlx

— NASA JPL (@NASAJPL) October 25, 2021

Perseverance landed on Mars in February and since then has been hard at work, searching for signs of ancient microbial life and collecting samples of Martian rock for return to Earth.

The diminutive Ingenuity helicopter traveled to Mars with Perseverance, and soon after arriving made history when it became the first aircraft to achieve controlled, powered flight on another planet. Since its maiden hover, Ingenuity has made more than a dozen flights, several of them covering more than 1,000 feet (305 meters). In fact, Ingenuity’s flight tests have gone so well that the aircraft has even been able to assist Perseverance by scouting locations for the rover to explore.

Besides models of the space vehicles, the roadshow will also feature in-person talks from scientists and engineers linked directly to the current Mars mission, with the speakers happy to take questions from audiences.

“The in-person events will include live activities at three venues to coincide with the one-year anniversary of Perseverance landing on Mars,” NASA said, adding that some of the roadshow’s exhibits will include digital displays with video, recent images captured during the mission, and even audio clips from Mars “to provide an authentic sample of what the rover is encountering as it explores the red planet.”

Visitors can also enjoy various science exhibits and displays, rock collections, spacecraft materials, and “interactive selfie stations.”

Take note, though. The full-scale models of Perseverance and Ingenuity won’t be on display at all of the museums that the roadshow visits. Those that will feature the full-scale models include The Museum of Flight in Seattle; the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.; the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia; the Exploratorium in San Francisco; the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York City; the Clark Planetarium in Salt Lake City; and the Adler Planetarium in Chicago.

Be sure to check NASA’s website for full details, including dates.

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
A NASA Mars rover has a giant hole in one of its wheels
A damaged wheel on NASA's Mars Curiosity rover.

 

If the tire on your car fails, it’s either a case of changing it yourself or getting someone to do it for you. For rovers on Mars, neither option is available.

Read more
Relive Mars rover’s ‘7 minutes of terror’ during landing 12 years ago
An animation showing the Curiosity spacecraft heading toward Mars.

At 1:31 a.m. ET on August 6, 2012, NASA’s Curiosity rover made a spectacular landing on the surface of Mars.

To mark the 12th anniversary, NASA has shared a video (below) in which members of the Curiosity team talk about how they achieved the remarkable feat, paying particular attention to the so-called “seven minutes of terror” during the final moments of descent.

Read more
Perseverance rover finds tantalizing hints of possible ancient life on Mars
mars 2020 perseverance rover

NASA's Perseverance rover was sent to Mars with one big, ambitious aim: to see if life could ever have thrived on our neighboring planet. Although there's unlikely to be anything alive on Mars now, the planet was once similar to Earth, with a thicker atmosphere and plentiful water on its surface. And during this time, billions of years ago, microbial life could have survived there. Now, Perseverance has located some tantalizing indications of possible microbial life -- although it's too early for scientists to be sure.

The rover has been taking samples by drilling into the martian rock as it travels, and it's a recent sample from an area called the Cheyava Falls that has ignited interest. The rock, collected on July 21, has indications of chemical signatures and physical structures that could potentially have been formed by life, such as the presence of organic compounds. These carbon-based molecules are the building blocks of life; however, they can also be formed by other processes.

Read more