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TODAYS TOP HEADLINES
The Times, Gainesville, Georgia | gainesvilletimes.com
Tuesday, November 27, 2018 3A
NASA craft lands
on Mars after
perilous journey
NASA I Associated Press
This illustration made available by NASA in October 2016
shows NASA’s InSight lander about to land on the surface
of Mars.
BY MARCIA DUNN
Associated Press
CAPE CANAVERAL,
Fla. — A NASA spacecraft
designed to drill down into
Mars’ interior landed on
the planet Monday after a
perilous, supersonic plunge
through its red skies, set
ting off jubilation among
scientists who had waited
in white-knuckle suspense
for confirmation to arrive
across 100 million miles of
space.
Flight controllers at
NASA’s Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena,
California, leaped out of
their chairs, screaming,
dancing and hugging, upon
learning that InSight had
arrived on Mars, the grave
yard for a multitude of pre
vious missions.
“Touchdown con
firmed!” a flight control
ler called out just before
3 p.m., instantly dispel
ling the anxiety that had
gripped the control room
as the spacecraft made its
six-minute descent.
Because of the distance
between Earth and Mars,
it took eight minutes for
confirmation to arrive,
relayed by a pair of tiny
satellites that had been
trailing InSight throughout
the six-month, 300-million-
mile journey.
The two satellites not
only transmitted the
good news in almost real
time, they also sent back
InSight’s first snapshot of
Mars just 41/2 minutes after
landing.
The picture was speck
led with dirt because the
dust cover was still on the
lander’s camera, but the
terrain around the space
craft looked smooth and
sandy with just one siz
able rock visible — pretty
much what scientists had
hoped for. Better photos
are expected in the days
ahead, after the dust cov
ers come off.
It was NASA’s — indeed,
humanity’s — eighth suc
cessful landing at Mars
since the 1976 Viking
probes, and the first in six
years. NASA’s Curiosity
rover, which arrived in
2012, is still on the move on
Mars.
“Flawless,” declared
JPL’s chief engineer, Rob
Manning. “This is what
we really hoped and imag
ined in our mind’s eye,” he
added. “Sometimes things
work out in your favor.”
NASA Administrator
Jim Bridenstine, presiding
over his first Mars landing
as the space agency’s boss,
said: “What an amazing
day for our country.”
InSight, a $1 billion inter
national project, includes
a German mechanical
mole that will burrow
down 16 feet to measure
Mars’ internal heat. The
lander also has a French
seismometer for measur
ing quakes, if they exist on
our smaller, geologically
calmer neighbor. Another
experiment will calculate
Mars’ wobble to reveal
the makeup of the planet’s
core.
“In the coming months
and years even, history
books will be rewrit
ten about the interior of
Mars,” said JPL’s director,
Michael Watkins.
InSight wasn’t out of the
woods yet: NASA awaited
word Monday night on
whether the spacecraft’s
vital solar panels success
fully unfolded. The pan
els must open to generate
power; otherwise, the mis
sion is a bust.
Over the next few
“sols” — or Martian days
of 24 hours, 39 1 /2 minutes
— flight controllers will
also assess the health of
InSight’s all-important
robot arm and its science
instruments.
Many Mars-bound space
craft launched by the U.S.,
Russia and other countries
have been lost or destroyed
over the years, with a suc
cess rate of just 40 percent,
not counting InSight.
NASA went with its old,
straightforward approach
this time, using a para
chute and braking engines
to get InSight’s speed from
12,300 mph when it pierced
the Martian atmosphere,
about 77 miles up, to 5
mph at touchdown. The
danger was that the space
craft could burn up in the
atmosphere or bounce
off it.
The three-legged InSight
settled on the western side
of Elysium Planitia, the
plain that NASA was aim
ing for. Project manager
Tom Hoffman said the
spacecraft landed close to
the bull’s-eye, but NASA
did not have yet have the
final calculations.
He said that it was hard
to tell from the first photo
whether there were any
slopes nearby, but that it
appeared he got the flat,
smooth “parking lot” he
was hoping for.
Museums, planetariums
and libraries across the
U.S. held viewing parties
to watch the events unfold
at JPL. NASA TV cover
age was also shown on the
giant screen in New York’s
Times Square, where
crowds huddled under
umbrellas in the rain.
The 800-pound InSight is
stationary and will operate
from the same spot for the
next two years, the dura
tion of a Martian year. It
will take months to set up
and fine-tune the instru
ments, and lead scientist
Bruce Banerdt said he
doesn’t expect to start get
ting a stream of solid data
until late next spring.
“It’s going to be awe
some. I can’t wait to start
seeing marsquakes,” Hoff
man said.
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Ukraine to impose martial
law after Russian aggression
BY NATALIYA VASILYEVA
AND EFREM LUKATSKY
Associated Press
KIEV — Ukraine’s par
liament voted Monday to
impose martial law in parts
of the country to fight what
its president called “grow
ing aggression” from Mos
cow after a weekend naval
confrontation off the dis
puted Crimean Peninsula in
which Russia fired on and
seized three Ukrainian ves
sels amid renewed tensions
between the neighbors.
Western leaders and dip
lomats urged both sides to
de-escalate the conflict,
and the U.S. blamed Russia
for what it called “unlaw
ful conduct” over Sunday’s
incident in the Black Sea.
Russia and Ukraine
blamed each other in the
dispute that further ratch
eted up tensions ever since
Moscow annexed Crimea in
2014 and threw its weight
behind separatists in east
ern Ukraine with clan
destine support, including
troops and weapons.
Ukrainian President
Petro Poroshenko asked
lawmakers in Kiev to insti
tute martial law, something
the country did not do even
during the worst of the fight
ing in the east that killed
about 10,000 people.
After a five-hour debate,
parliament overwhelm
ingly approved his proposal,
voting to impose martial
law for 30 days starting
Wednesday morning in 10
of Ukraine’s 27 regions —
those bordering Russia,
Belarus and Moldova’s pro-
Moscow breakaway repub
lic of Trans-Dniester. The
locations chosen were ones
that Poroshenko identified
as potentially in the front
line of any Russian attack.
The capital of Kiev is not
under martial law.
Poroshenko said it was
necessary because of intel
ligence about “a highly
serious threat of a ground
operation against Ukraine.”
He did not elaborate.
“Martial law doesn’t
mean declaring a
war,” he said. “It
is introduced with
the sole purpose of
boosting Ukraine’s
defense in the light
of a growing aggres
sion from Russia.”
Ukraine’s
Defense Ministry
already announced
earlier in the day that its
troops were on full combat
alert in the country.
The approved measures
included a partial mobiliza
tion and strengthening of air
defenses. It also contained
vaguely worded steps such
as “strengthening” anti
terrorism measures and
“information security” that
could curtail certain rights
and freedoms.
But Poroshenko also
pledged to respect the
rights of Ukrainian citizens.
His critics reacted to his
call for martial law with
suspicion, wondering why
Sunday’s incident merited
such a response. Porosh-
enko’s approval ratings
have been plunging, and
there were concerns that he
would postpone a presiden
tial election scheduled for
March.
Just before the
parliament met to
vote, Poroshenko
sought to allay those
fears by releasing a
statement revising
his original mar
tial law proposal
from 60 days to just
30 days, in order
to “do away with
the pretexts for political
speculation.”
Oksana Syroid, a deputy
speaker of parliament,
noted that martial law was
not introduced in 2014 or
2015 despite large-scale
fighting in the east. A state
of emergency “would pres
ent a wonderful chance to
manipulate the presidential
elections,” she said.
Despite Poroshenko’s
vow to respect individual
rights, opposition lawmaker
and former Prime Minister
Yulia Tymoshenko warned
before the vote that his
proposal would lead to the
possible illegal searches,
invasion of privacy and cur
tailing of free speech.
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