NASA Mars Mission Live Streaming NASA Mars Mission 2020 live photos videos NASA Mars rover perseverance

NASA's 5th Mars Mission: NASA is all set to launch the Mars 2020 Perseverance mission today (Thursday), from Florida's Cape Canaveral. For the launch of NASA's newest Mars rover, the car-sized robot - Perseverance, is all set to lift off towards the Red Planet. According to the American Space Agency, the perseverance will launch atop a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The rover will land on the floor of Mars' Jezero Crater on February 18, 2021.

After landing in Jezero Crater, the robotic astrobiologist and scientist will search for signs that microbes might have lived on Mars long ago, collect soil samples to be returned to Earth on a future mission and pave the way for human exploration beyond the Moon.

Perseverance will be accompanied by a helicopter called Ingenuity, the first attempt at powered flight on another world.

Earlier on Tuesday, NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover had begun the one-third-mile trek from United Launch Alliance’s (ULA) Vertical Integration Facility to Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 41.

The ULA Atlas V 541 rocket, with Perseverance aboard, was transported at speeds of 3 to 4 miles per hour during the approximately 30-minute trip.

NASA's 5th Mars Mission: Timings

The two-hour launch window opens at 5.20 pm IST (07:50 am EDT) and closes at 7.20 pm IST (9.50 am EDT). The live streaming of the event will begin at 4.30 pm IST (7.00 am EDT).

Meanwhile, the US Air Force 45th Weather Squadron is continuing to predict an 80 per cent chance of favorable weather conditions for the launch. The primary weather concerns for launch are cumulus and thick clouds.