A spilled plate of spaghetti on Mars?

Did someone spill a plate of spaghetti on Mars? That’s what you might think if you let your imagination run wild. But what we see in an image returned by the Perseverance rover last week is something quite different, in reality.

A gate, a serpent’s head, a stone in balance. For a few weeks, a few months, the missions that explore the surface of the planet Mars at this very moment never stop revealing funny images. This time, again, it’s Perseverance’s turn. A photo that NASA’s rover sent back to Earth last week shows something that might look like a plate of spaghetti. Or tangled laces, your choice.

The image was taken on July 12 — at Sol 495 — by one of the so-called hazard-avoidance cameras that scan the landscape ahead of the rover. To avoid disappointment. But NASA teams have not yet managed to clearly identify the object.

More and more debris on Mars

However, it’s a safe bet that the object in question is nothing more than a new space debris. Probably a residue of thelanding of Perseverance on Mars over a year ago now. It wouldn’t be the first time such debris has appeared in NASA images.

Already last month, Perseverance had spotted a shiny piece of metal. Identified as most likely a piece of its heat shield. A little earlier in the year, it’s the helicopter Ingenuity who had pointed others landing debris. Among which, the parachute of Perseverance. So much proof that space exploration leaves traces. And maybe the opportunity to seize the issue before it becomes a real problem.