Excitement Builds as NASA's Mars InSight Mission Stacked and Ready for Launch

On Saturday 5 May 2018,the first ever launch of a NASA planetary science probe from the West Coast will occur at Vandenberg Air Force Base,California.The Mars InSight spacecraft was transported to Space Launch Complex-3 at Vandenberg on 23 April and hoisted to the top of a  United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket,where it was carefully positioned,attached and tested by engineers and technicians.*
Mars InSight is headed for the Elysium Planitia region of Mars' Northern Hemisphere,where it is slated to land on 26 November 2018.Launch is scheduled for 7:05 am Eastern/4:05 am Pacific with a two hour launch window.
The spacecraft was designed and built by Lockheed Martin,with mission management by the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.Major contributions were also made by the French Centre Nationale d'Etude Spatiales and German DLR space agencies.InSight is intended to study the deep interior of Mars by taking its temperature with a burrowing instrument and listening for seismic events known as marsquakes.The data will enable the development of a map of the Martian interior,thus illuminating how Mars and,by extrapolation,other rocky planets such as Earth may have formed.*
Wind and atmospheric pressure and temperature will also be measured by InSight's sensors.At the same time,the seismometer on InSight can provide data on the many meteorites that penetrate the thin Martian atmosphere.Overall,it promises to be a highly informative mission,building up the knowledge base for crewed missions in the 2030s.*
In addition to InSight,the Atlas V will also be carrying the first ever CubeSats to venture into deep space,a technology experiment called Mars Cube One (MarCO).MarCO is actually a mini-spacecraft with two satellites that will test new communications and navigation capabilities for deep space missions,possibly including InSight itself.*
West Coast residents from Bakersfield,California south to Rosarito,Mexico may be able to view the spacecraft rising up and heading south.*
ULA is a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and Boeing.*
Lockheed Martin (LMT),Boeing (BA)