NASA Mars lander InSight falls silent after 4 years

Washington, Dec. 20 (U.S.): This could be the end of the dusty red streak for NASA’s Insight lander, which fell silent after four years on Mars.

The probe’s power levels have been waning for months due to dust covering its solar panels, the AP reports.

Ground controllers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California knew the end was near, but NASA reported that Insight unexpectedly did not respond to communications from Earth on Sunday.

“Insight should have reached the end of its operations,” NASA said late Monday, adding that its last communication was Thursday. It is not known what prompted the change in its energy. The team will continue to try to contact InSight, just in case.

InSight landed on Mars in 2018 and was the first spacecraft to document the earthquake.

It detected more than 1,300 earthquakes with the French-made seismometer, including several earthquakes triggered by the meter.

The most recent earthquake, sensed by InSight, earlier this year left the Earth shaking for at least six hours, according to NASA. Seismometer readings shed light on the interior of Mars.

Just last week, scientists revealed that InSight scored another target, capturing the Martian dust devil not just in pictures, but in sound.

Fortunately, the swirling dust plume exploded directly above the 2021 lander when its microphone was on. However, the other main landing gear had nothing but trouble.

A German drilling rig intended to measure the temperature of the Martian interior never made it deeper than 2 feet (half a meter), much less than 16 feet (5 meters). NASA announced her death nearly two years ago.

InSight recently sent out one last selfie, which NASA shared via Twitter on Monday.

NASA still has two active rovers on Mars: Curiosity, which has been roaming the surface since 2012, and Perseverance, which arrived early last year.

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