NASA probe on Mars may feel the ground shake as rovers land in 2021
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![NASA probe on Mars may feel the ground shake as rovers land in 2021](https://images.newscientist.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/18221726/22-dec_mars-insight.jpg?width=300)
NASA/JPL-Caltech
For the first time in history, the landing of a spacecraft on Mars might be “heard” in an unusual way – by the seismic waves it produces as it punches the surface of the planet.
The ears in this scenario are built into , which touched down in a region called Elysium Planitia on Mars in 2018. Since then, the stationary lander has been using instruments to study the planet’s geology, including a seismometer to detect seismic waves, and has found hundreds of seismic events known …