NASA has successfully tested a supersonic landing parachute that will be deployed in its Mars rover mission set to launch in 2020. The mission will rely on a special parachute to slow the spacecraft down as it enters the Martian atmosphere at over 5.4 kilometres per second. <br/><br/>Preparations for this mission have provided, for the first time, dramatic video of the parachute opening at supersonic speed.<br/><br/>The Mars 2020 mission will seek signs of ancient Martian life by investigating evidence in place and by caching drilled samples of Martian rocks for potential future return to Earth.<br/><br/>The mission's parachute-testing series, the Advanced Supersonic Parachute Inflation Research Experiment, or ASPIRE, began with a rocket launch and upper-atmosphere flight last month from the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in the US. This is the first of several tests in support of NASA's Mars 2020 mission.