Over the weekend, a giant balloon carried NASA's Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator (LDSD) up to 120,000 feet over Hawaii and then let it go. The flying saucer then began a half hour of powered flight, at the end of which it set down in the Pacific Ocean.
"The test vehicle worked beautifully, and we met all of our flight objectives," NASA project manager Mark Adler said in a statement. "We have recovered all the vehicle hardware and data recorders and will be able to apply all of the lessons learned from this information to our future flights."
This was the first of three scheduled tests for the flying saucer project. Beyond looking totally badass, the point of the LDSD is to test new landing technologies for future missions such as a return from Mars. The bowl shape is designed to dissipate the heat created as a supersonic craft reenters the atmosphere and must slow down enormously to land.