The Perseverance rover of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (POTfor its acronym in English) has recorded the sound of a giant dust eddy hitting the device planetary surface exploration site located on Mars.
Percy, as experts affectionately call the rover that landed in Mars’ Jezero Crater in February 2021, captured the eddy using its SuperCam instrument on September 27, 2021, while NavCam, together with the Mars Environmental Dynamics Analyzer (MEDA), accurately measured wind speed based on the sound intensity of the gusts.
According to the report published on the website of tech blogThis wasn’t the first dust storm Perseverance had detected, as the rover had already observed 90 dust eddies passing overhead, but this was the first time the microphone had been turned on.
How was the dust swirl?
This dust storm caused a slight drop in atmospheric pressure and an increase in temperature as it passed over the rover. He was at least 118 meters tall while traveling at approximately 20 kilometers per hour.
The Science News YouTube channel shared a video crediting PL-Caltech/NASA, LANL, CNES, INTA-CSIC, Space Science Institute, ISAE-SUPAERO, in which you can hear how the rover recorded the whirlpool hit.
“On September 27, 2021, Perseverance’s navigation camera detected a dust storm turning towards her at a distance of 50 to 60 meters. As the whirlwind swept past the rover, Perseverance’s microphone recorded the sound he made, capturing the first audio of a Martian dust storm (center), and the rover’s instruments detected a slight drop in atmospheric pressure (bottom).”, explains the description.
“These data may one day help researchers better understand dust dynamics on Mars.“, Add.