While the Night of the Stars encourages amateurs, scientists and the simply curious to scan the sky from Friday August 11 to Sunday August 13, remember that Mars is one of the five planets in our solar system that can be observed with the naked eye. But to get a closer look, the Perseverance rover touched down on its surface on February 18, 2021, with a dual purpose: to search for evidence of ancient life – according to NASA, there are three to five billion years, a third of the Red Planet was covered in water – and laying the groundwork for a future human mission from 2030.

Perseverance, director Michael Lachmann had to show to obtain permission to film part of this fifth NASA Mars mission from the nerve center of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. Briefly, of course, but enough to discover the atmosphere that reigns within the teams of researchers and to travel to the surface of Mars.

These seven days correspond to a specific mission for the small, over-equipped 4 × 4: it must travel about 1 kilometer towards the Jezero crater and take a rock core using its tungsten carbide drill. This sample will then have to be brought back by a recovery rover before being sent, by a capsule, to Earth.

Lot of contingencies

This for the theory. When we see the sharpness of the 3D images, we tend to forget that Mars is located approximately 225 million kilometers from Earth (average distance which may vary). This complicates the practical implementation, which the documentary follows chronologically, from “Day 1” where the technical sheet of the rover is detailed. Every day has its share of unforeseen events.

On “Day 2”, chief engineer Vandi Verma explains how, by putting on her 3D glasses, she sees the landscape around Perseverance as if she were on board, and can thus plan the optimal route, knowing that it runs at the top speed of 150 meters per hour.

On “Day 3”, head to the “center of the Universe”, the room where NASA centralizes communication with all spacecraft, before a digression (“Day 4”) to the artificial and toxic Salton Sea lake, in California, for its alleged analogy to ancient Martian lakes. On “Day 5”, it’s the turn of Ingenuity, a mini-helicopter capable of flying in an atmosphere a hundred times less dense than on Earth, to reveal its secrets. “On Day 6″…

The men and women of JPL know how to manage stress. Perseverance is still a $2 billion toy. “Every day there is a problem to solve, it’s normal,” said Ken Farley, a scientist associated with the mission. Al Chen, Landing Maneuver Manager, shares their method of staying optimistic: “We always assume the worst. »