New video, audio from Perseverance landing shows red, dirt-covered Mars surface with a gust of wind

NASA released a new video Monday from last week’s historic landing of the rover Perseverance on Mars.

“These are the stuff of our dreams. It’s what we’ve been dreaming about,” Al Chen, Perseverance entry, descent, and landing lead, said during Monday’s press conference talking about the new images and video.

The new video shows Perseverance’s landing last Thursday; showing the parachute deploying and then the descent to the planet’s surface. The planet’s reddish and cratered surface comes into focus as the rover slows down for a landing.

The first color images from the rover were shared Friday. NASA says their engineers were watching the new video over the weekend to gather any details and information about the mission, before sharing with the public.

Matt Wallace, Perseverance’s deputy project manager, said he had the idea to add video cameras after his daughter, a gymnast, asked for a sport camera. He said while he cannot do a backflip, watching the video from his daughter doing one made him feel like he was experiencing it.

Wallace said that feeling motivated him to contact the Perseverance team and have discussions about adding video cameras.

“It is unlikely I will pilot a rover down the surface of Mars, but watching this video, you get a glimpse of what it would be like” to land on Mars.

The rover is outfitted with 23 cameras, sending back images and videos from the so-called red planet. Dave Gruel, the project's camera lead, says the cameras on the rover were bought "off the shelf" and are commercially available to anyone. He said there were only small modifications made to make sure they would not interfere with other applications of the rover.

It also has 2 microphones.

NASA shared audio from the landing on Monday, as well. A few seconds into the audio clip, a gust of wind can be heard over the background noise of the rover.

Listen to the audio clip here.