What is the object in the Pancam panorama at Meridiani Planum?
A. Rob Manning, the Entry Descent and Landing Manager for the Mars Exploration Rover Project, offers the following comment about the object: “The Entry, Descent, and Landing team believes that this odd-looking feature is a piece of soft material that definitely came from our vehicle. We cannot say exactly where it came from but we can say that there are several possibilities: cotton insulation, Vectran covers and wraps from the airbag, Zylon bridle tensioning ties, or felt insulation from the gas generators… the list goes on. We do not think this is parachute material, however, due to its color (it does not look blue enough to be the undyed nylon or red enough to be the dyed nylon). Knowing the possibility that we could have left a bit of a mess nearby, once we saw this feature we only marveled at how clean everything looked and we have not given it another thought. (We found bits of Kapton tape just a few feet away from the Mars Pathfinder lander in ’97). We try to make sure that bi
