Finally! InSight’s Mole is Making Slow and Steady Progress

Engineers are using the scoop at the end of InSight's robotic arm to gently push on the Mole as it works its way into the ground. Image Credit: NASA/JPL/DLR

Personnel at NASA and the DLR have been working for months to get InSight’s Mole working. They’re at a disadvantage, since the average distance between Earth and Mars is about 225 million km (140 million miles.) They’ve tried a number of things to get the Mole into the ground, and they may finally be making some progress.

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Good News! The New Strategy of Using InSight’s Arm to Push the Mole Seems to be Making Progress.

There’s at least one small bit of good news in these challenging Covid-19 times. And it’s playing out on the surface of Mars. In a brief Tweet, NASA says that using InSight’s robotic arm to push the Mole into the ground is working, somewhat.

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Magnetic Fields Around Mars InSight are 10x Stronger than Scientists Expected

Artist's concept of NASA's InSight lander on Mars, layers of the planet's subsurface can be seen below and dust devils can be seen in the background. Credits: IPGP/Nicolas Sarter

When NASA’s Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (Insight) lander set down on Mars in November of 2018, it began its two-year primary mission of studying Mars’ seismology and interior environment. And now, just over a year and a half later, the results of the lander’s first twelve months on the Martian surface have been released in a series of studies.

One of these studies, which was recently published in the journal Nature Geosciences, shared some rather interesting finds about magnetic fields on Mars. According to the research team behind it, the magnetic field within the crater where InSight’s landed is ten times stronger than expected. These findings could help scientists resolve key mysteries about Mars’ formation and subsequent evolution.

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InSight has been Sensing Dust Devils Sweep Past its Landing Site

The InSight lander has been on the surface of Mars for about a year, and a half dozen papers were just published outlining some results from the mission. Though InSight’s primary mission is to gather evidence on the interior of Mars—InSight stands for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy, and Heat Transport—the lander also keeps track of Martian Meteorology. A new paper reports that InSight has found gravity waves, swirling dust devils, and a steady background rumble of infrasound.

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After a Challenging First Year on Mars, InSight Shows Us that Mars is Seismically Active

In this artist's concept of NASA's InSight lander on Mars, layers of the planet's subsurface can be seen below and dust devils can be seen in the background. Image Credit: IPGP/Nicolas Sarter

The NASA and DLR InSight lander has been on Mars for over a year now. The mission has faced significant challenges getting its HP3 (Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package) into the subsurface, but the spacecraft’s other instruments are working as intended. Now, researchers have published six papers outlining some of the mission’s scientific results.

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InSight’s Heat Probe Has Bounced Back Out Of Its Hole

InSight's Heat Probe (HP3) has popped out of its hole. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

This is sad news. After finding what seemed like a solution to the Mole’s difficulties on Mars, engineers are stymied again. The Mole, or Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3) has bounced half-way out of its hole.

It’s like Groundhog Day on Mars. If the Mole bounces out of its hole, it means six more weeks of engineers scratching their heads to come up with a solution.

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Success! NASA Confirms the Mole is Working Again.

The scoop on InSight's instrument arm exerting pressure on the Mole. This may supply the necessary friction to get the Mole going again. Image Credit: NASA/DLR

After months of setbacks, NASA says that the InSight Lander’s Mole is working again.

InSight landed on Mars on Nov. 26 2018 in Elysium Planitia. Its mission is to study the interior of the planet, to learn about how Mars and other rocky planets formed. InSight (Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy, and Heat Transport) is a NASA mission with other partners, including the DLR (German Aerospace Center.)

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There’s the Curiosity Rover, On the Move, Seen from Space

MSL Curiosity as imaged by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Image Credit: NASA/CalTech-JPL

If the Curiosity rover was paranoid, would it feel like it was being watched? Well, it is being watched, by its brother in orbit, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The MRO watched Curiosity as it travelled through the ‘Clay-Bearing Unit‘ in Gale Crater, during June and July, 2019.

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It Looks Like it’s Working! NASA InSight’s Mole is Making Progress Again Thanks to the Arm Scoop Hack

The scoop on InSight's instrument arm exerting pressure on the Mole. This may supply the necessary friction to get the Mole going again. Image Credit: NASA/DLR

NASA and the DLR are making some progress with the Mole. The Mole has been stuck for months now, and NASA/DLR have been working to get it unstuck. After removing the mole’s housing to get a better look at it with InSight’s cameras, the team came up with a plan.

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Here’s NASA’s New Plan to Get InSight’s Temperature Probe Into Mars

The mole with its wiring harness, and the scoop. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

The mole is still stuck.

The mole is the name given to the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3) instrument on NASA’s Mars InSight lander. It’s job is to penetrate into the Martian surface to a depth of 5 meters (16 ft) to measure how heat flows from the planet’s interior to the surface. It’s part of InSight’s mission to understand the interior structure of Mars, and how it formed.

But it’s stuck at about 35 centimers (14 inches.) The mole can do science shy of its maximum depth of 5 meters, but not this shallow. And NASA, and the DLR (German Aerospace Center) who provided the mole, have a new plan to fix it.

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