have a sensor to detect ground contact. Descent rockets are turned off at touchdown. Begin surface operations. The lander's mass is about but on Mars, which has 0.376 of Earth's gravity, it only weighs the equivalent of a object on Earth. On 26 November 2018, InSight successfully touched down in Elysium Planitia. A few hours after landing, NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey orbiter relayed signals indicating that InSight solar panels had successfully unfurled and are generating enough electrical power to recharge its batteries daily. Odyssey also relayed a pair of images showing InSight landing site. More images were acquired in stereo pairs to create 3D images, allowing InSight to find the best locations on the surface to place the heat probe and seismometer. Over the next few weeks, InSight checked health indicators and monitor both weather and temperature conditions at the landing site. Landing site As InSight science goals are not related to any particular surface feature of Mars, potential landing sites were chosen on the basis of practicality. Candidate sites needed to be near the equator of Mars to provide sufficient sunlight for the solar panels year round, have a low elevation to allow for sufficient atmospheric braking during EDL, be flat and relatively rock-free to reduce the probability of complications during landing, and have soft enough terrain to allow the heat flow probe to penetrate well into the ground. An optimal area that meets all these requirements is Elysium Planitia, so all 22 initial potential landing sites were located in this area. The only two other areas on the equator and at low elevation, Isidis Planitia and Valles Marineris, are too rocky. In addition, Valles Marineris has too steep a gradient to allow safe landing. In September 2013, the initial 22 potential landing sites were narrowed down to four, and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter was then used to gain more information on each of the four potential sites before a final decision was made. Each site consists of a landing ellipse that measures about . In March 2017, scientists from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced that the landing site had been selected. It is located in western Elysium Planitia at . The landing site is about north from where the Curiosity rover is operating in Gale Crater. On 26 November 2018, the spacecraft successfully touched down at its landing site, and in early December 2018 InSight lander and EDL