Context: NASA has declared the Mars digger dead after failing to burrow deep into the red planet to take its temperature.
Mars digger called mole, a 16-inch-long (40-centimetre) device that is part of NASA’s InSight lander couldn’t gain enough friction in the red dirt.
It was supposed to bury 16 feet (5 metres) into Mars, but only drilled down a couple of feet (about a half metre).
The mole’s design was based on Martian soil examined by previous spacecraft.
InSight landed on Mars in November 2018. The Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations , Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight)mission is a robotic lander designed to study the deep interior of the planet Mars.
It will be joined by NASA’s newest rover, Perseverance, which will attempt a touchdown on Feb. 18.
The Curiosity rover has been roaming Mars since 2012. Mars 2020 is a Mars rover mission by NASA's Mars Exploration Program that includes the Perseverance rover and the Ingenuity helicopter drone.
Curiosity is a car-sized Mars rover designed to explore the Gale crater on Mars as part of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission.
