4k Mars landing NASA space NoAA Climate

Mars is rotating more quickly than it used to, according to data that NASA’s InSight lander collected on the red planet.

The now-retired InSight was armed with a suite of instruments, including antennae and a radio transponder called RISE, or the Rotation and Interior Structure Experiment. The instruments were used to track Mars’ rotation during the mission’s first 900 days on the planet.

Astronomers determined that the planet’s spin is increasing by about 4 milliarcseconds per year², or shortening the length of a Martian day by a fraction of a millisecond per year. A Martian day lasts about 40 minutes longer than a day on Earth.