In this illustration, NASA’s Perseverance rover gets its first look at the Martian surface below, after dropping its heat shield just under six minutes after entry into the Mars atmosphere. Hundreds of critical events must execute perfectly and exactly on time for the rover to land safely on Feb. 18, 2021.
When the Perseverance landed on Mars, I watched it from work so I only did a quiet little happy dance.
Do you know who did NOT do a quiet little happy dance?
Alejandro Miguel San Martin- Alejandro has been a NASA engineer for over 35 years.
This is his FIFTH Mars landing.
I could watch him loving this moment in time over and over again.
I’ve posted the original video shot by his daughter because I like the little bio that she included.
So.
The next time we land something on Mars let’s go hang out with Alejandro. I think we will have a blast.
amm
A portion of the panorama captured by the Mastcam-Z camera system aboard NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover. The full panorama consists of 142 images taken on Feb. 21, 2021.
Great article:
NASA Chief Engineer Watches Perseverance Touchdown From Home & His Reaction Is Priceless
Alejandro Miguel San Martin, the chief engineer of four previous Mars landings had no choice but to turn his daughter’s childhood bedroom into a makeshift control room to monitor the NASA Perseverance landing.