Glenn engineer Christine Pastor is showing an unpacked flexible canopy beside its packed counterpart in NASA Glenn's 10×10 Super Sonic Wind Tunnel.
Glenn engineer Christine Pastor is showing an unpacked flexible canopy beside its packed counterpart in NASA Glenn’s 10×10 Super Sonic Wind Tunnel. The Flexible Canopy is a scale model of the parachute that will decelerate the Mars Science Laboratory in the upper Martian atmosphere. The Mars Science Laboratory is a rover that will assess whether Mars ever was, or is still today, able to support microbial life. It will carry the biggest, most advanced suite of instruments for scientific studies ever sent to the Martian surface. The rover is scheduled to launch in 2011. Photographer: Marvin Smith (WYLE)