NASA launches InSight spacecraft to Mars to dig down deep

A robotic geologist armed with a hammer and quake monitor rocketed toward Mars on Saturday, aiming to land on the red planet and explore its mysterious insides.

This image provided by NASA, InSight spacecraft launches onboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas-V rocket, Saturday, May 5, 2018, from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. InSight, short for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, is a Mars lander designed to study the "inner space" of Mars. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)

In a twist, NASA launched the Mars InSight lander from California rather than Florida's Cape Canaveral. It was the first interplanetary mission ever to depart from the West Coast, drawing pre-dawn crowds to fog-socked Vandenberg Air Force Base and rocket watchers down the California coast into Baja.

In this undated photo made available by NASA on March 29, 2018, engineer Joel Steinkraus uses sunlight to test the solar arrays on one of the Mars Cube One (Marco) spacecraft at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. The Marcos will be the first CubeSats - a kind of modular, mini-satellite - flown into deep space. They're designed to fly along behind NASA's InSight lander on its cruise to Mars. (NASA/JPL-Caltech via AP)

"This is a big day. We're going back to Mars!" NASA's new boss, Jim Bridenstine, said following liftoff. "This is an extraordinary mission with a whole host of firsts."

This image provided by NASA, InSight spacecraft launches onboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas-V rocket, Saturday, May 5, 2018, from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. InSight, short for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, is a Mars lander designed to study the "inner space" of Mars. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)

The spacecraft will take more than six months to get to Mars and start its unprecedented geologic excavations, traveling 300 million miles (485 million kilometers) to get there.

This photo released by NASA shows a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with NASA's InSight spacecraft onboard shortly after the mobile service tower was rolled back, Friday, May 4, 2018, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Calif. The rocket is set to launch early Saturday. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)

InSight will dig deeper into Mars than ever before — nearly 16 feet, or 5 meters — to take the planet's temperature. It will also attempt to make the first measurements of marsquakes, using a high-tech seismometer placed directly on the Martian surface.

This photo released by NASA shows a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with NASA's InSight spacecraft onboard shortly after the mobile service tower was rolled back, Friday, May 4, 2018, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Calif. The rocket is set to launch early Saturday. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP))

"That's the real payoff of this whole mission and that's still lying ahead of us," said the mission's chief scientist, Bruce Banerdt of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Although fog prevented Banerdt from seeing the liftoff of the $1 billion U.S.-European mission, he heard the roar of the rocket and all the blaring car alarms it set off.

This photo released by NASA shows a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with NASA's InSight spacecraft onboard shortly after the mobile service tower was rolled back, Friday, May 4, 2018, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Calif. The rocket is set to launch early Saturday. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)

"It was just an incredible moment," Banerdt told The Associated Press by phone. Despite the challenges still ahead, "I think I can bask in a little bit of satisfaction and just feeling like we really accomplished something today."

This photo released by NASA shows a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with NASA's InSight spacecraft onboard shortly after the mobile service tower was rolled back, Friday, May 4, 2018, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Calif. The rocket is set to launch early Saturday. (Bill Ingalls via AP)

Besides InSight, the United Launch Alliance's Atlas V rocket gave a lift to a pair of mini test satellites, or CubeSats, that are trailing InSight to Mars to serve as a potential communication link. Nicknamed WALL-E and EVE from the 2008 animated movie, the twin briefcase-size spacecraft popped off the rocket's upper stage in hot pursuit of InSight, as elated launch controllers applauded and shook hands following the morning's success.

NASA hasn't put a spacecraft down on Mars since the Curiosity rover in 2012. The U.S., in fact, is the only country to successfully land and operate a spacecraft at Mars. It's tough, complicated stuff. Only about 40 percent of all missions to Mars from all countries — orbiters and lenders alike — have proven successful over the decades.

In this photo released by NASA, the mobile service tower at SLC-3 is rolled back to reveal the United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with NASA's InSight spacecraft onboard, Friday, May 4, 2018, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Calif. The rocket is set to launch early Saturday. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)

If all goes well, the three-legged InSight will descend by parachute and engine firings onto a flat equatorial region of Mars — believed to be free of big, potentially dangerous rocks — on Nov. 26. Once down, it will stay put, using a mechanical arm to place the science instruments on the surface.

Banerdt said Mars is ideal for learning how the rocky planets of our solar system formed 4.5 billion years ago. Unlike our active Earth, Mars hasn't been transformed by plate tectonics and other processes, he noted. InSight might also help explain why some planets — like ours — went on to develop life, while others did not.

In this image released by NASA, a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas-V rocket with NASA's InSight onboard awaits launch, Friday, May 4, 2018, at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The rocket is set to launch early Saturday. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)

Over the course of two Earth years — or one Martian year — NASA expects InSight's three main experiments to provide a true 3-D image of the interior of Mars. Scientists know Mars has an iron core and a crust, but beyond that, the inside is "basically, completely unknown," said Banerdt.

The lander is equipped with a seismometer for measuring marsquakes, a self-hammering probe for burrowing beneath the surface, and a radio system for tracking the spacecraft's position and planet's wobbly rotation, thereby revealing the size and composition of Mars' core.

"InSight, for seismologists, will really be a piece of history, a new page of history," said the Paris Institute of Earth Physics' Philippe Lognonne, lead scientist of the InSight seismometer.

This illustration made available by NASA on March 29, 2018, shows the twin Mars Cube One (Marco) spacecraft flying over Mars with Earth and the sun in the distance. The Marcos will be the first CubeSats - a kind of modular, mini-satellite - flown into deep space. They're designed to fly along behind NASA's InSight lander on its cruise to Mars. (NASA/JPL-Caltech via AP)

Problems with the French-supplied seismometer kept InSight from launching two years ago. California was always part of the plan.

NASA normally launches from Cape Canaveral but decided to switch to California for InSight to take advantage of a shorter flight backlog. This was the first U.S. interplanetary mission to launch from somewhere other than Cape Canaveral.

The fog ruined the view for those gathered at Vandenberg along the central California coast. But it was a marvelous sight farther south. The rocket's bright orange flame was visible for some time as it arced upward across the dark sky west of greater Los Angeles.

Not even two weeks on the job, NASA's new administrator, Bridenstine, observed the launch on monitors at space agency headquarters in Washington.

"I can't think of a better way to start my day!" Bridenstine tweeted.

United Launch Alliance's president, Tory Bruno, also took to Twitter to celebrate. "Next stop: Mars."

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa was unsure what his future with the team will look like following Wednesday's benching for rookie Quinn Ewers.

For now, the former first-round draft pick said he will contribute in whatever way he can despite his disappointment with how this season has gone.

“Disappointed,” Tagovailoa said at his locker about coach Mike McDaniel's decision to demote him for Ewers. “I mean, I’m not happy about it, but it's something out of my control.”

The decision came after Tagovailoa struggled in a loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers, which eliminated Miami (6-8) from postseason contention. Ewers, a seventh-round pick by Miami earlier this year, will make his first career start Sunday against the Cincinnati Bengals, McDaniel said Wednesday.

Zach Wilson, who has been Miami’s No. 2 quarterback most of the season, will back up Ewers. Tagovailoa will be the emergency third quarterback.

“Naturally I’d say I’m disappointed,” Tagovailoa said. “I think it’s normal. It’s a normal human emotion. But outside of that, I’ve got to do my part. My role here right now is to help whoever the quarterback is going to be for this team.”

McDaniel said the decision came down to who he felt gave the Dolphins the best chance to win. Miami fell 28-15 at Pittsburgh on Monday night, closing the door on its playoff hopes with three games left in the season.

Tagovailoa threw for just 65 yards through three quarters on Monday, and the areas in which he has appeared to regress were evident again, from questionable decision-making to a lack of mobility that has hampered him throughout the season. He leads the NFL with 15 interceptions and hasn’t played up to his contract after signing a four-year, $212.4 million extension in July 2024.

Ewers was 5 for 8 for 53 yards in his only action this season in a lopsided loss to the Browns in October. He was the 231st player selected in the draft last April after starting three seasons at Texas.

“I’m super thankful that the staff believes in me to go out there and give us an opportunity to go win an NFL football game,” Ewers said. "And I know going back on it, telling my 10-year-old, 12-year-old self the opportunity that I have in front of me, he’d be pretty stoked.”

Tagovailoa was drafted by Miami after winning a national championship during a successful college career at Alabama, and he was expected to be the key piece that would end years of disappointment for the Dolphins, who have the league’s longest playoff-win drought.

That didn’t happen.

Tagovailoa instead struggled on the field his first two seasons under former Miami coach Brian Flores and was benched several times as a rookie. Rumors churned then about Miami’s intention of moving on from the quarterback.

The Dolphins fired Flores and replaced him with McDaniel for the 2022 season, and Tagovailoa later said that McDaniel built him up after Flores tore him down as a young player.

“I don’t coach with pessimistic forecasts,” McDaniel said Wednesday. "I coach to try to reach people. I believe in the players that are on the team. My job is to react and respond to situations. And when I have the conviction that a change needs to be made, I need to take action and not trivialize any game.

“These are players with a finite career. There’s games to be played in front of fans that paid to see them.”

The 27-year-old Tagovailoa had started every game this season but has a history of concussions. He missed six games last season because of a concussion and hip injury after playing 17 games in 2023. He led the NFL in yards passing that season, helped the Dolphins win 11 games to earn a wild-card spot and earned a big contract that included $167.2 million guaranteed.

Tagovailoa said he didn't think his injury history contributed to his regression this season. His 15 interceptions are a career high, he is on pace to finish the season with his worst passer rate (88.5) since his rookie season, and he has failed to throw for more than 200 yards in eight of his 14 starts. Before this year, he hadn’t had more than three such games in a season since 2021, his first year as a starter.

“I would say the biggest thing, and it’s being honest with myself as well, had been my performance,” Tagovailoa said. “I haven’t been performing up to the level and the capabilities that I have in the past.”

Tagovailoa declined to say whether he felt this decision would affect his future with the team.

A total of $54 million is guaranteed for 2026. The Dolphins would incur significant hits to the salary cap by releasing Tagovailoa. Releasing him next year would result in a $99 million dead cap charge. If the move is designated as a post-June 1 release, those charges are split over two years, with $67.4 million allocated to the 2026 cap and $31.8 million in 2027.

The Denver Broncos took the NFL's all-time biggest cap hit of $85 million for releasing Russell Wilson in 2024.

It's unclear if the Dolphins will stick with Ewers beyond Sunday. They close the season at home against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and at New England.

“In Tua’s shoes, it’s tough,” Ewers said. "I was benched in the middle of a game last year. So I mean, I know how he feels, and it’s a bad feeling.”

Maaddi reported from Tampa.

AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl

FILE - Miami Dolphins quarterback Quinn Ewers (14) throws a pass during the second half of an NFL football game against the Cleveland Browns, Sunday, Oct. 19, 2025, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/David Richard, File)

Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa (1) walks off the field after an NFL football game against the Pittsburgh Steelers in Pittsburgh, Monday, Dec. 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Justin Berl)