.ate," and others join us, it live sunday from noon to 3 p.m. eastern on book tv on the c-span2. earlier today, nasa is insight probe landed on mars after a six-month journey through deep space. the spacecraft is now tasked with exploring the planet's interior. today's landing was monitored by mission control at nasa's jet for partial -- jet propulsion laboratory in california. this is courtesy of nasa tv.

after traveling for more than six months and crossing 300 million miles, insight has reached its destination, the red planet, mars. welcome to mission control at the jet propulsion laboratory. an hour from now insight will begin the most hovering six and half minutes of the mission. the team is as prepared as can be, but who knows what mars has in store today? the mission support area is filled with engineers monitoring the situation, and for the first

time during the landing, you can be in the room, too. we have a 360 degree camera in the control room, allowing you to experience the landing right along with the team. there you see it. to look up the link, go to the watch page, that you see there on the screen. this mission has actually to 2 control rooms. the second is that lockheed martin just outside of denver, colorado. engine years there are on the 2.ond console, console people all over the world are tuning in at museums and libraries and other locations, including this one at the pasadena convention center. that is where friends and family are watching right now. there will also be an opportunity to watch from new york city -- there they are, cheering -- there will also be an opportunity to watch in new york city when the landing coverage gets displayed on the nasdaq tower in times square.

and of course, if you are watching, please snap a picture and share it with us using #marslanding. we would love to see it. now i would like to introduce you to nasa administrator jim bridenstine. thank you for coming. >> my honor. it is great to be here. >> thank you for being here. this is your first mars landing. jim: it is, in this job. i have witnessed these from the sidelines for many years. this is going to be a time you a successful landing on mars. everybody knock on wood. this is the first time to participate as the administrator. >> excited? nervous? >> not nervous. look at the amazing people here. >> all right, we have to have -- we hope to have you back on set after landing and maybe take a couple of social-media questions. if you would like to ask the administrator a question, use the #asknasa.

before you go, you did ask about the lucky peanuts, so this is your bottle to take in there. >> happily munching on these. >> all right, thanks for joining us. let's give you some background. insight is short for interior exploration using seismic investigations, geodesy, and heat transport. it is different from other mars missions, which all study the surface. insight is the first mission to study the interior of the red planet. >> the basic idea of insight is to map out the deep structure of mars. we know a lot about the surface, we know a lot about it as a sphere -- its atmosphere, but we don't know much about what goes on a mile below the surface, to miles what goes on below the surface. this is the first mission to investigate the deep inside of mars. of --w that earth's habit

habitat -- we might be of a to find out in terms of the structure of mars versus the structure of earth that maybe can help us understand why that is. >> insight carries a seismometer which measures seismic waves and maps of the deep interior structure of mars. >> we will have a heat probe and a physical properties program which will penetrate into the mars surface about five meters from 16 feet, to take the temperature of mars. and it has a radio science experiment which uses the radio on the spacecraft to measure small variations in the wobble of mars' pole to understand more about the structure and composition of the core. >> insight will be the first mission to pick instruments off the deck of the lander and place them on the surface of mars. i like to say that we are playing the claw game on mars with no joystick. besides, the seismometer has to be installed in one place.

>> we also have a wind and thermal shield that will be placed on top of that to protect it further from the environment. >> for the heat probe, it also needs to sit in one place, take a while to hammer itself down into the ground, and acquire the thermal measurements over a long period of time. >> insight is a mission to mars, but it is much more than a mars mission. in some ways, it is like a time machine. it is measuring the structure of mars put in place 4.5 billion years ago, so we can go back and understand the processes that warmed mars shortly after it was created from the solar nebula. by studying mars, we will learn more about earth, venus, mercury, even the moon, and exoplanets around other stars.

gay: landing on mars is always difficult. more than half the missions fail. experts in this field are systems engineers for entry, defense, and landing. let me introduce you to two in our control room. christine will be making the mission callouts during landing and julie is our color commentator who will help explain mission operations. christine, let's start with you. i understand that there was a final software update and adjustment. what does that mean? >> that's right, yesterday we sent the last edl software parameter update to the spacecraft computer. this update told the spacecraft exactly when it will hit the top of the atmosphere and also fine-tune things like when to deploy the parachute. this software is very important because insight uses the software to perform entry, descent, and landing completely on its own. mars is so far away from earth that when a command is sent it takes eight minutes to reach the spacecraft. entry, descent and landing from

aboutto finish, is eight minutes long, so insight has to do this all by itself. gay: all right, its fate is sealed. i understand that the team is about to do a readiness pull. .- a readiness poll can you fill us in on that? >> sure. that is going to be a poll to the communications engineer and the orbiters and antennas we have on earth. we have marco listening in on us, and our reconnaissance orbiter will be listening to the data and recording it for us, and then the radio science engineers will be eavesdropping in on our signals from other way back to earth. our edl communications engineer will be checking to make sure they are ready to go and ready to support us in under an hour on mars. gay: all right, we're standing by for that readiness poll. i understand that the peanuts are going to be passed in there pretty soon? >> that is the idea.

we will be passing on the peanuts after that. for those of you who don't know, the peanuts are a tradition that gives us a little bit of extra lock on any critical events. if anyone wants to join in and peanut extra good luck vibes, we would love to have it. gay: there is a story behind that that way back when in the were days of jpl, there several missions, six ranger missions to the moon that failed. but then with ranger seven, somebody passed around peanuts. >> and it worked. [laughter] and you don't mess with what works. so, it is not a superstition, it is a tradition. we just give ourselves a little extra lock. gay: all right. if you have peanuts at home, please have some. nasa has had seven successful mars landings, but the edl team never becomes overconfident. jpl chief engineer says that things have to work just right during six and a half critical

minutes. >> although we have done it before, landing on mars is hard, and this mission is no different. the process to get from the top of the atmosphere of mars to the surface is called entry, descent, and landing, or edl. it takes thousands of steps to go from the top of the atmosphere to the surface, and each one has to work perfectly to be a successful mission. the process starts well above the top of the atmosphere of mars. the cruise stage faces the sun. it also has its radio, which faces earth. but now we don't need the cruise stage. its job is done. the next step, just seven minutes before rising to the top of the mars atmosphere is to separate the cruise stage. before you hit the top of the atmosphere, though, the space capsule has to orient itself so the heat shield is precisely

facing the atmosphere. now the fun begins. the vehicle is moving at nearly 13,000 miles an hour. but it is hitting the top of the atmosphere at a very shallow angle, 12 degrees. any steeper, the vehicle will hit the thicker part of the atmosphere and burn up. any shallower, the vehicle will bounce off the atmosphere of mars. at the top of the atmosphere it is about 70 miles above the surface of mars, and the air is starting to get thicker and thicker. as it does that, the temperature on the heat shield, gets well over a thousand degrees centigrade. enough to melt steel. the vehicle decelerates at a backbreaking 12 earth g's, and about 10 miles above the surface of mars, a supersonic parachute is launched out of the back of the vehicle. 15 seconds after, it is time to get rid of the heat shield. six pyrotechnic devices fire

simultaneously, allowing the heat shield to fall and tumble away from the vehicle, exposing the lender to the surface of mars. 10 seconds after the heat shield is it dropped, three prior technically deployed legs are released and locked for landing. a minute later, the landing radar is turned on, sending pulses towards the surface of mars. the vehicle starts to try to measure how high it is about the surface, and how fast it is going. about a mile above the surface of mars, the lender falls away the landernder -- falls away and lights the center. very quickly the vehicle must rotate out of the way so the parachute does not come down to hit it. the last thing that has o happen is that on the moment of contact, the engine has to shut down immediately. if they don't, the vehicle will tip over. if all the steps of entry, descent, and landing happened

perfectly, and we are safely on the surface of mars, we will be ready to do exciting new science. ♪ gay: let me introduce you to someone who has been working on insight for seven years. hey is project manager, tom hoffman. seven years, and today's the day. tom: that's right. seven years, but we are a little over 40 minutes now and we will be on the surface and it will be awesome. all worth it. gay: so let's talk about insight. using tried-and-true technology based on phoenix -- this time there is a bigger challenge with communications, correct? normally we have an orbiter that can give us communications, but it is different this time. tom: that's right. most of the time when we have landed recently we have the odyssey and we get real-time data as we go through edl. we have come to expect that and we really, really want that. in this case the primary orbiter

is the mars reconnaissance orbiter. it will be listening to us on the uhf. if you go to the video, you can see this. it will be listening to us and getting all the primary data, and it will send it back to us , unfortunately, only three hours after we land. gay: so it does not give the live information. >> it does not. we have a couple of other sources we're looking at. the max planck observatory in germany. for those give us a couple -- but those only give us a couple of points in time. we get something cool this time. hopefully these are both working great today. and we are hoping that they will continue to work all the way through edl, and they will be giving us a real-time feed. we will show how that works on the video there. you can see insight getting close to mars. but we have 2 stalkers following us.

may have been following us since we launched, they launched on the same launch vehicle as us. you can see the green is we're sending uhf signals to them. they turn around and give a much stronger signal to earth. we cannot communicate on uhf direct to earth, but marco can. he can send signals on the way down to the surface. we will have great communication coming from marco. gay: so marco is basically trying to fill the gap that we would have had if we have live communication coming down to us. so if that doesn't work, does it affect insight's mission at all? >> not at all. it is a little more nailbiting, but right now it looks like it will be working. but it does not impact the insight at all. the spacecraft will phone home once it gets on the ground. it will have gone through seven months of the cruise. it will call back and say, "hey, i'm on the surface, i'm feeling pretty good, everything looks good so far." >> also to prep the audience, even after the landing we are

not out of the woods just yet. >> not just yet. quite literally we are going to kick up a lot of dust on land. we need to let it settle before he went to unfurl our solar rate. we are 100% solar powered. so it is very important that we get those out. unfortunately, both mro and marco will be out of view by the time we have them completely and fraud. so we will have to wait 5.5 hours until odyssey comes by and that, yes indeed, our solar rays are out. we will have a celebration when we get the successful landing, but we will have to temper that just a bit and wait 5.5 hours to know for sure that we are in good shape. gay: so we have immediate knowledge, so just to run it through once again, what will happen with edl? we have the video that shows how exactly this will play out in six and a half minutes. and we can roll the video.

>> you can see we are attached to the cruise stage. we dropped back off. we said, thank you for the ride to mars. it burns up in the atmosphere. you can see it gets very hot on our heatshield. in some places maybe 3000 degrees fahrenheit as we go through this. we are on the heatshield for about four minutes. that dissipates 90% of the energy before getting to the surface. then we popped our parachute and we are going 860 miles an hour. we're on that for about two minutes. we drop off the heatshield. we start acquiring the ground without radar like an f-16 jet radar. the lines will pop is, we start every drop of very quickly. a bit terrifying for me. the descent thrusters, we have 12 of them. 68-pound thrusters dropping us to the ground and slowly, slowly we drop down going only five miles an hour. 6.5 minutes of tear, a little less than the seven minutes, which is great for me. we gotta from 12,300 miles an hour, 1075 miles above the

surface of mars and then we get to the surface at about 5.5 miles an hour. gay: that is amazing. before we go, there is a couple of pictures to show you. we have watch parties taking place all over the country. see if we can put those up for you to see. this is ohio. this is a person who has a watch party in a classroom. isn't that great? both are watching with us. >> people all across the globe are watching this. >> i will let you back. i know you are excited. take care. thanks for joining us. >> thank you. ♪

gay: ok, these are the folks who built viking in 1976, and mars phoenix in 2008. the operations team is there, and the lockheed insight edl manager is standing by. tim, what is going on in there? team is getting excited. we are just about half an hour away from entry. the team is excited and focused, but also very excited about the upcoming successful landing we are getting close to. gay: we talked about the fact that insight is based on tried-and-true technologies, but you had to make a couple of changes for insight. what were they? >> yes, so obviously as he said,

we have leveraged phoenix a lot. there were a lot of great things we took from the phoenix mission, but insight is a unique mission. it is landing towards the equator of mars, and a number of things are different. where we are lending, we are landing,where we are we are about 1.5 kilometers higher in altitude. in addition, what that has required us to do is come in a little more shallow. in addition, we are a little bit heavier than phoenix was, so we had to increase some of the strength of the lander itself. we deployed parachute a little bit higher because of some of the differences in the entry timeline. and because of when we are landing, we are landing towards the end of dust season. so we have actually increased of the thickness of the heatshield. we are about a quarter-inch thicker on the heatshield to accommodate the potential sandblasting we could see doing entry, descent and landing. a number of things have changed, but we have leveraged a lot from the successful phoenix mission as well. gay: that is fantastic. you were able to customize it. there were concerns earlier on that there was a dust storm

taking place, it was dust storm season. tim: that's right. in fact, we have had a lot of great support from our orbiting assets -- mro and odyssey, a couple of spacecraft that we jpl and were with built here by lockheed martin to they have actually provided a lot of great insight into the weather on mars and dust storms on mars. the last couple weeks, on the surface of mars we are anticipating a very nominal, seasonal weather pattern in terms of both density, atmosphere, as well as temperature. dust storms appear to be very benign. we are very optimistic it is a great day for landing on the surface of mars. gay: all right, great news. thanks, tim, and i know your team is getting excited as much as we are. tim: thanks a lot. ok. gay: the time is 11:21. the tension is building in both control rooms. it is 20 minutes before separation.

cruise stage separation is pastted about 40 minutes the hour, so we are indeed getting close. so, where is insight going to mars? it is a place called elysium panecea. it is located near the equator north of gale crater, not too far from curiosity rover. the team calls it the biggest parking lot on mars. it is a place that is safe, got plenty of sunshine, that will power solar instruments to study the interior of mars. narrator: what is inside mars? we know a lot about what is inside earth, but on mars we have scratched the surface. to learn how mars formed, we have to study it's a deep interior. nasa's insight lander was designed to do just that by taking the planet's vital signs,

listening for its pulse or seismic activity, including any marsquakes, taking its temperature to see how much heat is flowing from inside, and checking its reflexes to see how much the planet wobbles as it cooks around the sun. -- as it w. these all provide clues to what the planet is like inside. so what is inside mars? insight can help us out by giving mars its first thorough checkup since it formed 4.5 billion years ago. the more we learn, the better we will understand the planets and the history of our solar system. gay: joining us now is bruce banner, the principal investigator of mars insight. insight is a mission to mars, but we keep hearing again and again it is more than a mission to mars. bruce: that's right. we are to study the martian interior and map out the position inside mars, but we

want to use the information to understand more about the solar system as a whole and how the rocky planets form. >> and rocky planets -- we have an image to show, folks. we're talking about earth, the moon, mars. bruce: mars, venus, the planets of the inner solar system that are made mostly of rock. they all share the same basic structure, with a dense iron core, rocky mantle, and then a crossed of lighter silicate , rocks. crust of lighter,? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >>? >> silicate rocks. the very detail of the thickness of those layers, the sizes and the compositions give us a lot of clues as to how those planets form and why they went down different paths into the different planets we see today.

>> explain to me -- we are going to have a lander. you are going to be on the surface. how will you be able to study interior? >> we use what are called the geophysical instruments that use the principles of physics to see through the rocks. we used seismic waves, the same way you might use a flashbulb to take pictures of something. we are using marsquakes, which send out vibrational waves to the planet, and as they go through the planet, they reflect off boundaries and change their velocity. it changes the wiggles you see on the seismograph. when we go to the planet, you can see that here, it hits the very boundaries and the waves are reflected. sometimes they are bent. it becomes a pretty complicated pattern. scientifically, we have learned over the last 100 years how to interpret the code of the signals as it comes back up to the surface and the seismometers pick up the signal and turn it into data, that we can use on earth to understand what the 3-d structure is of the planet. gay: normally you use three seismometers. in this case, you are bringing

five. how are you going to be able to get the information using one? >> well, we had to get kind of clever. you could use multiple seismometers to get in on where the earthquake is. on mars, we are going to do something a little different. we are going to use not only the p and s waves, but we will use the surface waves. you can see these moving out from the marsquake, and as it passes over the insight lander, you can see the seismograph in the upper left-hand corner where you have the wiggles. mars is not so large. they still have a fair amount of amplitude. they've not gotten completely amped out by the time they get around the planet. finally, even the other way around the planet, it comes across and hits a third time.

we have extra information over just the p and s waves. we have the surface wave arrivals to pinpoint the distance of mars quick to the lander. then you use something called polarization analysis to figure out which direction the waves are coming from. by doing that, we can do the same thing we can do with the three stations, just lazing those two waves. gay: there is another instrument that is also being carried up by insight. bruce: that is our heat flow probe. it is a cool instrument that to burrowhanical mole its way down into the surface. it has a motor winds up the hammer and knocks itself down a few millimeters and a time. we do that 20-30,000 hammer strokes and we hope to get 16 feet below the surface. once we are down there, we are actually measuring the heat coming out of the planet by measuring the temperature along the table as it comes to the surface, and looking at how the

temperature increases as we go down, and extrapolate that deep into the planet to understand how much energy there is inside the planet to drive the geology , marsquakes and all kinds of -- activity. gay: it is amazing how much you learn from the surface about the interior. >> it is amazing and something i've been working on my whole professional career. i find it fascinating. gay: all right, we will talk about that. thanks. bruce thought of the mission like this, as he mentioned, 40 years ago when he was a graduate student. the rest of the team is not waited quite that long, but this is a big moment for them, too. we sat down with a few of the members and asked what it is going to be like as we get close to landing. >> it is a very difficult thing to do, and every thing has to go perfectly. as humans we sent in 17 different missions to the

surface of mars and 10 of them have crashed. before we land on mars, we have to get to mars. how do we get to mars? >> the main responsibility of the navigation team is to ensure that the spacecraft is in the martian atmosphere. the parking location is about 12 kilometers in size. accuracy is comparable to shooting a basketball from the staples center in downtown l.a. in hitting nothing but net new york city that is moving at a speed of two feet per second. and the spinning on its axis. >> it is about 60 miles long and we can bend anywhere in that ellipse. >> we have tested pieces of the heat shield. we tested the parish and placing best we tested the parachute by putting it in a wind tunnel. putting that together in a tightly controlled sequence where every single thing has to go right, we have never tested that. the first time it is going to happen is when it delivers us to mars.

♪ gay: it is about 11:29 a.m. pacific, and you are watching live coverage of the insight landing from the nasa jet propulsion laboratory in pasadena, california. we are about a half-hour away from landing, and people all over the world are watching. take a look at some maps of that we have for you. this is a watch-in-person map, where people have watched parties all over the world, come of the united states, paris, berlin, even off the coast of madagascar. and folks in the big apple will also be watching today. the nasdaq tower will be switch over to landing coverage for about an hour. people in times square can watch, too. later today nasa will have the honor of ringing the closing bell, and that will be a little over an hour from now.

if you are watching, take a picture and send it to us using #marslanding. here is one. i believe it is from the california science center in los angeles, and i am told mayor eric garcetti will be visiting later today. things are getting e for the team now. let's check back in with julie in the control room. what is going on, julie? >> we have heard from mro a couple of times mars reconnaissance surface. they are doing great. we have heard from both marcos, a and b, and they are doing great. everybody is ready to go. we're pretty excited. >> fantastic. we will check back in with julie in a moment. this is a good time to tell you more about the technology experiment we've been telling you about, marco.

insight does not have an orbiter in position to send the edl data back live, so the cube test hopes to fill that gap. here is how that will work. >> communicating between mars and earth requires complicated choreography with everything in the right place at the right time. sometimes hours can past before information is relayed from one location to the other. that is why the rocket will carry two tiny satellites on a technology test of their own. meet mars cube one, marco, the first cube mission to deep space. they will test out new miniaturized technologies. if they make it to mars, they can relate information back to earth about insight's descent and touchdown and do it in mere minutes. although this is crucial to the success of the lander, this could change the way future spacecraft phone home. >> all right, let's check back

in with julie to see if the marcos are ready to support and listen for insight. julie, what do you know? >> they are ready to go. i haven't heard it coming up yet, but they are ready to go and they are both healthy and doing great, which is wonderful news. i think -- actually, i think they should be doing it in just a minute. >> we will stand by and listen, then.

>> we can confirm we are entry minus 20 minutes. the star tracker has been powered off. >> software has been initiated, so when we are improved, we use the star tracker in a similar manner to how we use them years ago. now that we are close enough to mars, we don't need that anymore, so we will transition, and that let's us basically use velocity and acceleration, so we

don't need to star tracker right now. >> marco clarify. >> appropriate attitude for bent pipe. >> ok, thank you very much. >> and that was obviously our confirmation, so that is great news. >> fantastic. >> so i was saying before that the software will propagate from here on out, so we have powered of our star tracker and every thing is looking great. >> ok, thanks, julie. all right, the cruise stage separation is about four minutes away. joining us now, the chief engineer at jpl and an absolute veteran of mars landings. we will play a little video for you now. you haven't seen it yet, but we will roll it.

>> lander is still alive. >> there you are. you were sitting -- [laughter] [applause] >> yeah. that is what it looks like when it is successful. >> yes. [laughter] >> i hate to see what it would have been like if it wasn't successful. >> but talk about that. what is edl like? why is it so hard? >> it is many years of work by many, many people, and particularly because we cannot test the landings on this planet. it is much more complicated. mars has a lower atmosphere, thinner atmosphere, less gravity. imagine you have a big broadway

production you cannot do the show until all the audience shows up. that is what it feels like. you never really know if you have done it right. >> well, we have done it seven times. can we say piece of cake, we know how to do it? >> no, i don't think so. we get better of it, no doubt. we have learned from our successes and failures, including failures of missions outside the country. we try to put what we learned together and just do the best we can. if we don't succeed, we will learn, because we're collecting data on the way down. if something bad happens today, we are able to take what we learned, even if we may fall on the ground kicked off the horse, we get back up and see what we did wrong and get back on the horse. >> very quickly, give us possible scenarios of what could

happen during edl today, especially during communication. >> the great use of having communication -- almost anything can go wrong, there is a very good chance we will figure it out. things like the parachute -- you don't open parachutes on earth going 1.5 times the speed of sound. you don't do that. you don't need to on this planet. but we have to because if we wait longer we will be on the ground. a very complicated radar system has to work from outer space all the way to the ground. what if it locked up on the heatshield? we tried to fix that problem to prevent it from happening. and like that happen and the vehicle could have things bad happen -- >> at this time mro will have loaded the electric sequences. >> cruise stage separation.

>> go ahead. >> at this time mro will have loaded the electric sequences. marco is expecting carrier lock anytime. marco-b has reported the bent pipe. still waiting. >> copy that, thank you.

>> science report, uhf carrier detected. >> edl -- [applause] >> marco bravo has locked on the carrier. marco alpha has also locked on the carrier. [applause] >> as expected -- [indiscernible] >> copy that, thank you.

>> all station inside systems, lost the signal from insight, indicating expected cruise stage separation. standing by for uhf signal acquisition via marco or radio science. we are about five minutes from entry. we have confirmation we have lost the signal from insight. this was expected because we have transition from the antenna on the cruise stage to the uhf antenna on board the spacecraft. ground stations have detected the uhf signal and marco has locked on the signal. this confirms that insight is transmitting uhf signals as expected. insight's telemetry through the marco relay is not expected until two minutes before entry. >> so that is exactly what we

were hoping to hear, that -- >> the vehicle has also performed the turn to entry maneuver. the vehicle is turning away and oriented itself to enter the martian atmosphere. >> wow, this is a big first step. just getting the cruise stage separated, it is the vehicle turning itself to the right orientation. the cruise stage is going to be further and further away. three or four football fields away. it will burn up in parallel as the vehicle enters mars. >> christine mentioned turned to entry. what does that mean?

>> because the cruise stage has to push off to one side, the rest of the vehicle has to turn to face the atmosphere. >> this is taking all the heat coming into the atmosphere. >> exactly, it will be a source of drag but also thermal protection, because it gets 1500 degrees celsius on the heat shield. very, very hot. but on the inside of the heat shield, it is only a few degrees above room temperature. it is a wonderful protective device to keep our lander safe. >> all right, the next thing we are standing by for is? >> is entry. gradually slowing down. right now the vehicle is just now beginning -- very soon will be beginning to feel the atmosphere touching it. it is a half minute or so after answered before we start really detecting the fact that the atmosphere is slowing it down. >> all right, we will be standing by. entry is scheduled for 11:47.

entry times are locked in, correct? >> they are. they are locked in.

selected the target and aim to the vehicle precisely. that allows them to know the entry point, 35 to 55 kilometers from the center of mars. >> we know those times are locked in, but what about the other events -- >> dropping carrier power is expected. [applause] >> both marcos have telemetry. >> they are doing their job. relaying 1s and 0s with a few seconds lag from the vehicle up to these two vehicles, and back to earth to the deep space network using the expand antenna. >> keep in mind this was all an experiment. we weren't sure this was going to work, but we had this need that we did not have live communication in this particular mission. >> we don't need their information except if something goes wrong. we have other -- >> we are receiving insight telemetry via the marco relay.

[applause] >> watch the data flowing onto the screen -- >> this data will provide detailed information about the state of the spacecraft throughout edl. >> we were on pins and needles about that because we weren't really sure. >> this is wonderful news. if this continues working all the way to the ground and beyond, we might see a first picture from the surface of mars. >> wouldn't that be great? >> atmospheric entry on my mark. 3, 2, 1, mark. [applause] gay: here we go. >> a few seconds, the vehicle will start sensing the atmosphere. 22 kilometers from the center of mars.

it will start to slow down very slowly, of course, but then faster and faster and faster, until it reaches about seven g's. i make that mistake on the video. it is seven g's, not 12. but it will very quickly slow down. [voice over speaker] in approximately one minute, insight is expected to reach its maximum heating rate. plasma blackout is possible during peak heating and could cause a temporary drop out of telemetry. this could last for as long as two minutes. >> the gas that come heat shield as it is slowing down, it looks like a meteor if you are on mars watching the streak go by. that gas does interfere with the radio reception, so it is possible that marco will lose the signal allowing it to go to the very hot entry. >> not to be alarmed. >> not to be alarmed, it is a part of the design we completely

expected. >> plasma blackout is expected. >> ok. wow. >> ground stations have reported plasma blackout. still receiving insight telemetry via marco. >> marco alpha has carrier interruption. >> insight should now be experiencing the peak heating rate. portions of the heat shield should reach 3000 degrees fahrenheit as it protects the lander from the heating environment. >> that is hot. >> carrier interruption but still in lawlock. >> insight has passed through

peak deceleration. telemetry shows the spacecraft -- >> marco alpha and marco bravo -- >> radio science carrier detected. [applause] >> distant communications coming in. >> insight is traveling at a velocity of 2000 meters per second. >> seems to have passed this very critical point of peak heating, peak deceleration. the next big step is parachute inflation. >> we can see that on our timeline at the bottom of the screen. next event is parachute deploy. >> insight is now traveling at 1000 meters per second. once insight slows to meters per

second, it will deploy its supersonic parachute. the partnership will deploy nominally at mach 1.7. standing by for parachute deploy. >> radio science reports sudden change in doppler. >> ground stations are moving signals consistent with parachute deploy. [applause] >> marco alpha, marco bravo maintain lock status. >> telemetry shows parachute deployment. radar powered on. [applause]

heatshield separation commanded. >> this is really good news so far. i'm on pins and needles. >> we have radar activation, where the radar is beginning to search for the ground. once the radar locks on the ground, insight is one kilometer above the surface. the lander will separate and begin terminal descent using its 12 engines. altitude convergence -- the

radar has locked on the ground. >> yes! [applause] >> standing by for lander separation. >> carrier interruption on marco alpha and marco bravo. >> lander separation commanded. altitude 600 meters. gravity turn, altitude 400 meters. 300 meters. 200 meters. 80 meters. 60 meters. 50 meters. constant velocity. 37 meters. 30 meters. 20 meters. 17 meters. standing by for touchdown. touchdown confirmed.

[raucous applause] [laughter] >> wow. >> that's fantastic. >> never gets old. >> no, it doesn't. control room just erupted. >> fabulous, fabulous. >> marco sitting there. >> the designer -- what a great team.

this is really fabulous. thank you. >> lots of fist pumping going on there. what a relief. we had over to the camera over in times square. boy, people are weathering the rain to see this. >> this is the hardest part.

the thing has a lot more to do, though. a lot more will go on today and in the days that follow before the science can begin. just getting the vehicle from earth to the surface of mars is no mean feat. >> talk about that. i mean, just the mere accomplishment we are seeing. >> you have to understand, this vehicle is very complicated. it is using 12 engines. each of those pulse 10 times a second, releasing these tiny impulses almost like little

bullets that keep the vehicle going at a constant velocity as it approaches the ground and still going over five miles an hour. we still don't know the state of the vehicle right now. we need to make sure there are no rocks nearby and the solar panels in about five to 10 minutes will begin to open up and wait for the dust to settle, because there is certainly a lot of dusting in the air around the vehicle right now which is now just settling. >> so we are standing by after touchdown. it waits a couple of minutes. and so we are standing by for that. it is the communication that to earth from insight. it comes directly from earth to insight. >> and to the deep space network. insight might be able to relay an image or partial image taken just a few -- a couple minutes

after landing. i'm standing by in hoping to see that. if that doesn't happen, we will certainly get more images later. >> we see bruce banner waiting for it. i don't know if they see it yet. >> they are waiting, looking carefully at the camera to see what they might see. waiting for the image to come back. >> this is the first image from insight itself. insight is taking a picture with

one of its two cameras. probably a view of what is directly in front of the spacecraft, right in front of the lander. this is a camera it would be using to figure out if this is a good space, a good place to put down our instruments. it is going to take an image and send that image to the marcos. the marcos in turn will relay it back down to earth. [cheers] >> let's see what they saw. there it is. wow. i don't see a lot of -- don't see a lot of -- >> let's explain that image. this image has a dust cover -- >> we have lost the signal from marco. >> [indiscernible] for uhf. >> yay, marco. [applause] congratulations.

oh, there it is. you can see a better view. there is the horizon back there. bluish sky. one of the lander deck. i can't make it out but it looks like there's not a lot of rocks, but those dots you see are likely to be dust particles on the lint, dust cover. which will be removed. >> it will get another shot later on. >> insight -- sorry, the relay communications job is done. they are taking pictures back towards mars. hopefully mro, which flew overhead which flew overhead, i'd have been lucky enough to capture this insight lander on its parachute, while this is going on, mro's flying overhead recording the data, also monitoring the transaction and recording, every single --

signal is good. later for the rover, we might be able to see it deflated. >> that is fantastic here we are standing by now. i am here. i'm ok. [indistinct conversations]

>> carrier detected. [applause] >> copy that, thank you. >> we have got it perfect. >> this is what we really hope we imagined in the minds eye. sometimes things work out in your favor. it certainly looks like it was a successful and perfect landing to her we will have to see as we get more data how well things go. as the vehicle perceives the solar panels are to put.

hopefully we are on a hill and it doesn't look like we are. they will be deployed safely we hope and we will get confirmation around 5:00 local time here in about 4.5 hours from now. >> this is so difficult because there is no way any of these engineers could possibly control the vehicle. it all began in software. >> we have to train it to do the work on its own. >> carrier, 30 seconds passed the first acquisition. we are on the surface. >> it is happy and the weather -- the lander is not

complaining. show the long for the rest of the afternoon on mars. >> and are you are anxious to get in. thank you for sitting here and helping us out. all right i will let you go. take care. [indistinct conversations] >> recording completed at 20:04.

[indistinct conversations]

>> all right. we said we would bring back the administrator to get your take on what it would be like to get into the control room. what is it like? >> intense. it was very quiet when it was time to be. with every new piece of information received. very different being here than watching it on tv by far, i can tell you that. as soon as it was over, i got a call on my cell phone. it is got to be someone important, so i answered it and

it was the vice president to you watched the whole thing and was ecstatic about the program. he is a chairman of the national council. a keen advocate for what we do. to have him call within seconds of mission success was great. just so everyone knows, he wants me to say congratulations to everyone here at nasa and all the international partners and everyone who has contributed to this mission. what an amazing day for nasa. gay: it is an amazing accomplishment in that this is something happening millions and millions and millions of miles away and these people are able to do it. >> what is fascinating, the whole time watching and i'm thinking every milestone eight minutes ago, from mars to earth.

it is exciting back and -- but step back and realize this has already occurred in history. it is a unique experience. the enthusiasm is incredible. let's get through december. he think about what is happening next. it will be a rocket. it was scary. we have that underway december 3. the first science data that on december 7. that is not too far away either. then you have an orbit shortly after christmas,-- no shortage of exciting things.

for people not aware, went to put her back in 2014 and give us stunning images and data and information science on pluto pair that mission is still going strong. it is an asteroid belt well beyond pluto taking images, and object which we have never been able to go out and take images of anything close range before. you ask what is happening next. we have right now at nasa, there is more underway, i don't know how many years tops,, there are always activities at once. we will work in the holiday but a lot of amazing discoveries are being made. >> it is so funny because he

basically answered the question, has it influenced to the timeline for mars missions? >> everything we learned about mars at this point will help us understand today. insight could provide good information about liquid water on mars and how to get to it. we strongly believe there is liquid water 10 kilometers under the surface of mars. the answer is yes, the more we learn, the more we're able to achieve. to get to mars, yes. but the lunar mission, go to the moon, go sustainably with international and commercial partners, and that means we will have reusability built into the system. we will test and prove technology at the moon that

ultimately, we can replicate it mars. we will improve at the moon, only a three-day journey, we saw that with apollo 13. we need to use the moon as a ground. in the meantime, when you join learn as much about mars as possible. insight has its seismometer. it will help us know how often mars getting impacted and if those humans will experience impacts. >> it is pretty much our goal. to learn about and build upon those missions. >> nasa has a long history of doing amazing work and building on past successes and failures. >> that is true. >> what an amazing time to be at the helm of this extraordinary agency.

>> we are glad you are here to share it with us. thank you for joining us. you need to go in there and celebrate with these folks. thank you. mars exploration, if you are not convinced yet, talk about these scientists and engineers. no one conveys the excitement so much more than the people who actually work on the mission. 15 california cities. they call that the inside insight roadshow. ♪ >> we're here in san francisco, part of insight roadshow. it is the first interplanetary mission we ever launched from california and we are doing a lot of public engagement activities.

>> we are talking to the public and getting them excited and sharing information they probably would not catch us from the website. >> we have a replica of the actual launch vehicle, a selfie station where people can take pictures. children really like mars. >> we invite kids to come in and jump. we have a little seismometer on the floor that measures ground motion. students can come and jump next to it, they make their own. >> i have had people come to me and say this is the most i've ever understood about a space mission. i'm so happy i came because i now understand what you're doing and why it is important. >> she was able to explain a lot of what happened. it is great. kids who want to learn about mars. >> ok. we want you to meet another mars veteran. director mike, you are a manager

for curiosity. >> absolutely. this is the fifth mars lander that i have worked on. we may be getting a handle on it, finally. >> does it get old? >> we're just as nervous every time. we can't do anything. it is a feeling of helplessness. it is such a crazy time and we can't do anything. i think you just always have the nervousness. but we have confidence in the team and the engineers and scientists, that they did anything they could do and it is now out of their hand. >> our eighth successful landing. we learn from this, we learn a little more and we do it at our

next time, pretty much. >> exactly. we went through all the failures from all of the missions. even if they are not nasa missions. each one of them tells you a little something, and extra test you should do or thing to guard against either in the atmosphere or in touchdown. we learn from all of these and we have recently been very successful. gay: we had a situation for example where odyssey could not be in place to give us can medications, and so marco came about. >> marco was such an incredible's tory. we couldn't have mars odyssey do it for these events. have the replay, we embarked on the crazy idea to build these, something high school kids could build these days. they go around the earth. these are the first interplanetary outside of the

earth's orbit. the sole purpose was to do the relay. a cool flat antenna, they relate the signals in real time for us. just amazing. a lot of career folks here with a little bit of adult supervision. that is how it was built. they did a fantastic job on marco and it exceeded all of our wildest expectations. it is a great tribute to the whole marco team. you saw them there with the special blackshirts. a fantastic thing. not only did it work for the mission, but it opens up the door for more missions like that. we put other missions on them. it is a whole new door thanks to them. they are much less expensive. gay: so the qubes, they were made with off-the-shelf parts? >> a combination of on the shelf

and off-the-shelf parts. we had the radio of course, antennas are little bit new technology. a lot of this is standard stuff to replicate at a lower cost. >> what do you think in terms of other missions carrying their own relays and not having to depend on an orbiter? >> they might carry with relays. they can do more than just relays. they can take pictures, spectrometry, a lot of stuff we would like to do with orbiters. there is a chance we could send them to venus, asteroids, mars, a lot of stuff we can do and we're just learning the kid ability of what we can put on these. -- they capability of what we can do with these. it is a great first effort. >> absolutely. one question for you. a social media question from george from the u.k. how long did it take to plan and

build insight? >> the insight itself, typically the missions take from the time we started to the time we launch it, five years. two things happen. one to our advantage and one not. we had a lot of heritage from a mission called phoenix. so a lot of design work had already been done because it was done for mission phoenix. a a lot of the basic design we inherited for this mission. on the other hand, we had a bit of bad luck because the instruments, the seismometer is so unbelievably precise. it is so hard to build that we couldn't quite get it ready. that in partnership with the french and a lot of other countries in europe such as the u.k. and switzerland, and other folks. we cannot quite get it ready for launch, we had to wait two years and it took an extra two years because of that. it is only lined up to watch every six months. it took us a little longer.

>> speaking of the international, it is a perfect segue of where we are next. throughout the program, we have been trying to introduce you to the people behind this. for the insight mission, it requires you go beyond our borders. this is truly an international mission. let me introduce you to a swiss italian scientist, domenico g iardini. >> some of us, it is a lifetime problem. i worked on earthquakes and i am a professor at university. seismic risk, that is my field. insight is a mission which is geared to measure the specific parameters that help us characterize the area. there are two main reasons why international cooperation is important. there is a big motivation, and

community and knowledge goes my faster -- goes much faster. the role in this mission is to deliver electronics. we will provide daily routine analysis. this is what our students work on. how the planet develops. direct relevance of how we understand the earth. it is so interesting. gay: and the partnership goes far beyond individual scientists. take a look at this, it is a picture of the calibration tool on the deck of the insight lander. it is recognition of our international partnerships with the french government space agency connect, and the german aerospace center as well. notice the logos. it is my pleasure to welcome the project manager, an executive

board member. i cannot imagine a better day. what was your reaction? >> i am very enthusiastic and very grateful for all of the people in the mission. team, wets go to the now have a picture. a new adventure in the best conditions. thank you for that. >> definitely a new adventure. hans, what is your feeling? on that deck, it is ready to go. >> yes, it is not our job. first, i would like to congratulate our partners here in the u.s. for great job. it is not easy to land on mars. the first time we went on mars as i have experienced it, it is a great day.

this was really exciting so far. it was really exciting so far. now the job stops for us. >> it is funny. you had once said -- you are a musician as well. you play jazz. you see exploration and music is very similar. how is that? >> yes. because of the human management of all that activity is the same, the technique. do have a seismometer, or do have an orchestra? [indiscernible] best performance, everything is important. gay: and, we should let people know that we will not be able to collect science writer way? we will start several months from now? >> the deployment will take about two or three months. of course, we will have some

data during the deployment, but the best data to make the best science will be about the beginning of march. gay: all right. >> we prepare now. gay: yes, we prepare now. [laughter] >> it was a great job so far for our team and all of the teams and as you said, it needs a lot of people to bring it up to mars and make it a successful mission. gay: i have to say congratulations. all right. thank you for joining us. here is another profile now. meet robbie, and it is his job to keep healthy on mars. -- to keep insight healthy on mars. >> we get to explore the universe and see things no one ever has seen before. my name is to keep it healthy when it is on mars. insight is the first spacecraft made to go to mars and a healthy mars works. i have the insight spacecraft has healthy batteries.

we have heaters that keep warm enough. we look at many other parts of our space craft on a daily basis to be sure we have a successful mission. there are thousands of people working on insight. changing one part of the spacecraft ripples through the entire system and how that affects other parts. left for about three years and worked for a nonprofit where i used to my engineering and design skills that i learned at nassau to help people in poverty. we do herehe stuff impacts every single person around the world. no matter whether they know or not, has been impacted by nasa technology. we are the next generation of explorers. >> all right. let's meet robbie in person, in our sandbox, instrument laboratory. wait a minute. where did the beard come from? robbie: [laughter] there were about 10 of us who decided that we would not shave again until seven months after

we landed on mars. not only because of the mission on the surface of mars, but i also have local little girls at home who love to pull in my beard. [laughter] gay: all right. what happens next? insight is not out of the woods just yet, correct? >> right. we have very important steps ahead of us. we will do a series of checkouts to make sure everything survives this landing on mars, then once is complete, we will start to deploy our mission onto the surface. gay: what exactly is involved with the instrument deployment? robbie: this is the first time we are deploying on mars using a robotic arm to put instruments on the surface. the process will put seismometers on mars as well as the probe.

it takes about 12 months, a long time, because we have to be careful that everything happens like it needs to. we can't send a technician if something goes wrong, so we went to get it right the first time. >> all right. in our interview, we heard we may be looking at not until march before we get science? >> that is right. we get some amount of signs -- of science immediately, temperature data, wind data, but then, once we start getting seismic data, that will be in the march timeframe. >> all right. can you explain to me, what do you do there? where you are? robbie: this is the martian sandbox. for the past few years, a great team has been testing and deploying our instruments on a variety of rock, snow. so we will test out deploying our interest -- or estimates one more time before actually doing it on mars. >> thanks. congratulations. now that insight is on mars, it needs some changes inside.

it is no longer cruising to mars, so the team no longer needs the cruise mission support area. in a little while, the team will hand over operations to our new group sitting in another jpl control room. missionthe surface support area, in another building here at jpl. this is rather team will be operating insight from here on. the handover is the final step, and it will take place around 1:00 our time, about a half hour away. for us, it is time to say goodbye. congratulations to the insight team and to our edl system engineers. onnd by for a news briefing the set tv at 2 p.m. pacific, 5 p.m. eastern. for those who want the latest information on insight, and mars, go to nasa.gov/mars.

thank you all who shared pictures on social media. it was wonderful to share this historic event with you. we have pictures for you that we will live u.s.. thus we will leave you with. enjoy and congratulations. ♪ of therrow, the chairman national trade commission joins commissioners for a senate commerce subcommittee hearing on the ftc's budget and parties at 2:30 p.m. eastern, on c-span3. it also watch online, or listen on the free radio up. former president barack obama since done with former secretary of state, james baker, for a discussion on public service u.s. leadership in the world, live from rice university in houston at 8:45 p.m. eastern. ♪ >> what does it mean to be american? that is this year's c-span's student camera video

competition. students from around the country are posting on social media about it. illinoisent from tweeted -- what does it mean to be an american? social studies students brainstorming constitutional rights. national characteristics. and important people and events of the nation. lauren from pascoe county, civica tweeted -- students brainstorm ideas for c-span's studentcam. gary hawkins has two students who have had their projects recognize and i think he is going for his tri-factor. fisher high school today to speak with the government class. we discussed freedom of speech and the first amendment. >> and, from william dendy middle school in fort lauderdale --eted -- you can camp studentcam 2019.

project-based learning at its finest. we are asking middle and high-school students to produce a five to six minute documentary answering the question, what does it mean to be an american? 100,000 dollars in total cash prizes including a grand prize of $5,000. the deadline is march 20. for more information, go to c-span.org. the un security council held an emergency meeting in new york on monday to talk about the conflict between russia and ukraine after three ukrainian naval ships were seized by russia off the coast of crimea over the weekend. this portion of the meeting is 35 minutes. >> thank you, mr. president. when ian a month ago, last briefed the security council on the situation in ukraine,