Why It's HARD To Land on Mars
Support MinutePhysics on Patreon! http://www.patreon.com/minutephysics This video is about why it's harder to successfully land spacecraft and landers and rovers on Mars than on Earth, or...
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When it comes to landing spacecraft on planets, or moons, or back here on earth – Mars sucks.There’s a lower success rate landing on Mars than on Venus, the moon, the earth, evenSaturn’s moon Titan.And in large part, this is because Mars’s atmosphere is in the perfect goldilocks zoneof being a total headache.On the moon (or an asteroid) you can use lightweight spacecraft made essentially out of tinfoilbecause there’s no air to cause drag or pressure or heat.Essentially, you save weight not having heat shields or thick walls, but need to use rocketsto land in what’s called a “powered descent.”On earth, or Venus, or Titan, there’s enough air that you can land largely unpowered, firstby slowing down with a heat shield and atmospheric drag, and then with par...
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When it comes to landing spacecraft on planets, or moons, or back here on earth – Mars sucks.There’s a lower success rate landing on Mars than on Venus, the moon, the earth, evenSaturn’s moon Titan.And in large part, this is because Mars’s atmosphere is in the perfect goldilocks zoneof being a total headache.On the moon (or an asteroid) you can use lightweight spacecraft made essentially out of tinfoilbecause there’s no air to cause drag or pressure or heat.Essentially, you save weight not having heat shields or thick walls, but need to use rocketsto land in what’s called a “powered descent.”On earth, or Venus, or Titan, there’s enough air that you can land largely unpowered, firstby slowing down with a heat shield and atmospheric drag, and then with par...
