NASA LIVE: Perseverance successfully lands on Mars

The Mars 2020 Perseverance rover touched down on the red planet Thursday afternoon.

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During landing, the rover plunged  through the thin Martian atmosphere at more than 12,000 mph (about 20,000 kph). A parachute and powered descent slowed the rover down to about 2 mph (3 kph). It landed on six wheels at the Jazero Crater.

Perseverance also is carrying a technology experiment – the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter – that will attempt the first powered, controlled flight on another planet.

“If there’s one thing we know, it’s that landing on Mars is never easy,” said NASA Associate Administrator for Communications Marc Etkind. “But as NASA’s fifth Mars rover, Perseverance has an extraordinary engineering pedigree and mission team. We are excited to invite the entire world to share this exciting event with us!”