NASA’s lander InSight is believed to have captured the audio of a quake on Mars for the first time, the space agency said on Wednesday.
The faint signal was recorded on April 6, the lander’s 128th Martian day.
It said if confirmed, it would be the first recorded event coming from inside rather than being caused by forces above the surface of the Red Planet.
“We’ve been collecting background noise up until now but this first event officially kicks off a new field: Martian seismology!,’’ InSight principal investigator Bruce Banerdt said in a statement.
One of the main objectives of InSight, which landed on Mars in November and is scheduled to operate for no less than the next two years, was to collect data on the planet’s interior.
While the event was too small to provide solid data and scientists were still looking at the recording to identify the exact cause of the noise, scientists believe it to be a milestone.
“We’ve been waiting months for a signal like this.
“It’s so exciting to finally have proof that Mars is still seismically active,’’ Philippe Lognonne, a planetary seismology expert at the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris in France, said.
dpa/NAN
