Liftoff Videos

Every mission, with the videos that tell it

Mars

Mars, in a colour image processed from Emirates Mars Mission data, 2021.

Photo: Kevin Gill from Los Angeles, CA, United States / CC BY 2.0

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun, a cold, desert-like world with a thin atmosphere of mostly carbon dioxide. Its surface gravity is about a third of Earth’s, and temperatures range from minus 153 to 20 degrees Celsius. It has frozen water in the ground and at the poles, but no liquid water on the surface. No person has been there. Everything known about its surface comes from robotic spacecraft, including the NASA rovers Curiosity and Perseverance, both covered here. Wikipedia notes that roughly sixty percent of spacecraft sent to Mars failed before completing their missions.

Events

Videos on this topic

The videos, in date order

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  1. Curiosity’s Mars Landing: Sky Crane, Touchdown and First Images

    NASA

  2. Curiosity’s Mars Landing: Entry, Descent and Sky Crane at JPL

    NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

  3. Perseverance: Seven Minutes From Mars Atmosphere to Touchdown

    NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

  4. Perseverance: Inside JPL Before the Seven Minutes of Terror

    Mark Rober

  5. Perseverance Landing on Mars: Descent Call-Outs and Real Footage

    NASA

  6. Perseverance’s Mars Landing: Descent Callouts From 12 km Up

    BBC News

  7. Perseverance Landing Footage: Parachute to Sky Crane Touchdown

    Guardian News

  8. New Glenn NG-2 Live: ESCAPADE to Mars and a Booster Landing Try

    Everyday Astronaut

  9. New Glenn NG-2 Countdown: ESCAPADE Launch and Booster Landing Plan

    Everyday Astronaut

  10. Curiosity at 14: Keeping a Mars Rover Running by Remote Control

    Modern Mechanisms

  11. How the Sky Crane Landed Curiosity on Mars in Seven Minutes

    Future Systems Explained

  12. Six Mars Rovers Compared: Landings, Discoveries and Distances

    Cardsplained
Play video: Six Mars Rovers Compared: Landings, Discoveries and Distances

Six Mars Rovers Compared: Landings, Discoveries and Distances

Cardsplained

Duration 12:42

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Dates are when each video was first published on YouTube.

All the videos

  1. New Glenn NG-2 Live: ESCAPADE to Mars and a Booster Landing Try

    Launch coverageEveryday Astronaut · 2:29:30

    Mission: New Glenn NG-2 ESCAPADE

  2. New Glenn NG-2 Countdown: ESCAPADE Launch and Booster Landing Plan

    Launch coverageEveryday Astronaut · 2:33:06

    Mission: ESCAPADE (New Glenn NG-2)

  4. Curiosity at 14: Keeping a Mars Rover Running by Remote Control

    Mission explainerModern Mechanisms · 10:53

    Mission: Curiosity

  5. How the Sky Crane Landed Curiosity on Mars in Seven Minutes

    Vehicle explainerFuture Systems Explained · 3:00

  6. Perseverance Landing Footage: Parachute to Sky Crane Touchdown

    DocumentaryGuardian News · 3:09

    Mission: Perseverance

  7. Curiosity’s Mars Landing: Sky Crane, Touchdown and First Images

    Launch coverageNASA · 9:23

    Mission: Curiosity

  8. Perseverance: Inside JPL Before the Seven Minutes of Terror

    Mission explainerMark Rober · 15:58

    Mission: Perseverance

  9. Perseverance: Seven Minutes From Mars Atmosphere to Touchdown

    Mission explainerNASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory · 3:11

    Mission: Perseverance

  10. Perseverance’s Mars Landing: Descent Callouts From 12 km Up

    Mission explainerBBC News · 3:26

    Mission: Perseverance

  11. Perseverance Landing on Mars: Descent Call-Outs and Real Footage

    DocumentaryNASA · 3:26

    Mission: Perseverance

  12. Curiosity’s Mars Landing: Entry, Descent and Sky Crane at JPL

    Launch coverageNASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory · 2:31

    Mission: Curiosity

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