NASA Mars Exploration Rover Perseverance, longest drive outside Earth

Cumulative distance exceeds 45 km after 2021... Up to 100km possible

(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Kim A-ram = The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)'s Mars exploration rover 'Perseverance' set a record for traveling the longest distance by an exploration vehicle in the solar system excluding Earth.

According to the US daily New York Times (NYT) on the 12th (local time), NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) announced that Perseverance's cumulative mileage exceeded 28.06 miles (about 45.2 km) the previous day.

This is the distance traveled by Perseverance while exploring the Jezero Crater and surrounding areas after landing on Mars in February 2021.

This broke the driving record of 'Opportunity', a small exploration rover previously sent to Mars by NASA. Opportunity carried out exploration activities on Mars from 2004 until communication was lost in 2018.

Perseverance, which is the size of a small car, can avoid obstacles and reach its destination on its own using autonomous driving technology, without requiring detailed directions from Earth.

Initially, management expected Perseverance to set a new record last August.

However, exploration activities took about two more months as they discovered brightly colored rocks that may be the oldest rocks ever studied on Mars.

Before sending Perseverance to Mars, NASA certified that this rover can travel 20 km. We are currently working on expanding the driving range certification to 100 km.

Matthew Wallace, an engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said, "If it continues to move as it is now, I think it is quite possible to exceed 100 km."