NASA Invites Media to Discuss First Mission to Study Mars Interior, First Interplanetary Launch from West Coast

NASA’s next mission to the Red Planet will be the topic of a media briefing at 5 p.m. EDT (2 p.m. PDT) Thursday, March 29, at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. The briefing will air live on NASA Television and the agency’s website.

NASA’s Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) lander will study the deep interior of Mars to learn how all rocky planets formed, including Earth and its moon. The lander’s instruments include a seismometer to detect marsquakes and a probe that will monitor the flow of heat in the planet’s subsurface.

Briefing participants will be:

·      Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington

·      Bruce Banerdt, InSight principal investigator at JPL

·      Tom Hoffman, InSight project manager at JPL

·      Jaime Singer, InSight instrument deployment lead at JPL

Media who would like to attend the briefing must RSVP by noon on Monday, March 26, to Elena Mejia of JPL Media Relations at elena.mejia@jpl.nasa.gov or 818-354-5011. Valid media credentials are required and non-U.S. citizens must bring their passports. To participate by phone, media must RVSP for dial-in information no later than noon on Thursday, March 29.

Media and the public also may ask questions on social media during the briefing using #asknasa.

InSight will be the first planetary spacecraft to take off from the West Coast. It’s scheduled to launch May 5 aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex-3 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. If pre-dawn skies are clear, the launch will be visible from Santa Maria to San Diego, California.

Follow the mission on Twitter at:

https://twitter.com/nasainsight

-end-