NASA rover spots rock shaped like medieval helmet on Mars

NASA’s Perseverance rover stationed on Mars spotted a dome-shaped rock with a striking resemblance to a helmet used during medieval times.

The martian rock, captured by Perseverance’s primary camera on Aug. 5, is pointed at the top and dome-shaped on top of a flared brim. It has a rough, textured surface covered in small bumps.

The image was selected as Perseverance’s best photo during its 234th week on Mars, though scientists working on its team noted it’s not the first time the rover has encountered that type of igneous rock.

“This rock’s target name is Horneflya and it’s distinctive less because of its hat shape (which looks to me to be generally consistent with the pyramid shape we often see in of wind-eroded float blocks on the surface of Mars) and more because it’s made almost entirely of spherules,” David Agle, a spokesperson for the Perseverance team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, told Space.com.

The rock’s odd composition will help scientists further understand how Mars’ environmental history, including its “internal processes,” formed the unique landscape over billions of years, the outlet reported.

Perseverance’s primary mission, though, isn’t to collect baubles.

The rover was launched on July 30, 2020 to search for ancient microbial life on the Red Planet to aid scientists in studying its habitability.

Its research will help scientists get closer to sending a person to Mars as NASA inches ever closer to its final goal in the Artemis program, which seeks to establish a permanent base on the Moon to oversee the first astronaut landing on the Red Planet.

SpaceX CEO and former Department of Government Efficiency head Elon Musk is also eyeing interests on Mars with loose plans to launch uncrewed trips as early as 2028.

In the meantime, Perseverance has been working overtime.

It was first sent to survey the Jezero Crater to probe Mars’ “wet history” — a trek it only just completed in December 2024 three years after landing.

“Conceivably, microbial life could have lived in Jezero during one or more of these wet times. If so, signs of their remains might be found in lakebed or shoreline sediments,” NASA says on the home page for the mission.

NASA currently has four other rovers on Mars. Sojourner, the oldest and most antiquated of the five, landed on Mars in July 1997, according to NASA.

The second-eldest rover, Opportunity, was originally built to last just three months on Mars. Instead, it pressed on for a staggering 15 years before shutting down in 2019.