Seven months and 300 million miles from the spot at Cape Canaveral where it launched, NASA’s Perseverance rover is scheduled to land on Mars at 3:55 p.m. today to begin its search for signs of ancient life and test technology for future human missions to the Red Planet. But those last few thousand miles will be the most difficult and dangerous of the mission, and there’s no guarantee the $2.7 billion spacecraft will make it down to its destination, the unexplored Jezero crater, in one piece.
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