Sound on 🔊 These "bloops" are the sound of a meteoroid impact on Mars - the first time it has ever been recorded! The seismometer on @nasa’s InSight lander picked up vibrations and sounds from four separate impacts over the last two years. That peculiar sound is caused by an atmospheric effect that’s also been observed in deserts on Earth, where lower-pitched tones arrive before higher-pitched ones. Every meteoroid creates a shock wave as it hits the atmosphere and an explosion as it hits the ground. The bigger the explosion, the more the sound wave tilts the ground when it reaches InSight. InSight’s team suspects other impacts may have been hidden by noise from wind or seasonal changes in the Red Planet’s atmosphere. But now that the distinctive sounds of an impact on Mars have been heard, scientists expect to find more within the lander’s nearly four years of data. #Mars #InSight #SolarSystem #seismology #research #data #sounds #science #OMGRobots #NASA #JPL