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NASA's newest Mars rover has sent back the first-ever sounds of driving on the red planet — a grinding, clanking, banging affair that by Earth standards would be pretty worrisome.

The noises made by Perseverance's six metal wheels and suspension on the first test drive two weeks ago are part of a 16-minute raw audio feed released on Wednesday by Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

READ MORE: NASA rover lands on Mars after hazardous descent

"If I heard these sounds driving my car, I'd pull over and call for a tow," Dave Gruel, an engineer on the rover team, said in a written NASA statement.

"But if you take a minute to consider what you're hearing and where it was recorded, it makes perfect sense."

Perseverance — the biggest, most advanced rover ever sent to Mars — landed near an ancient river delta on February 18 to search for signs of past life.

READ MORE: Interstellar object is cookie-shaped planet shard, new report claims

Samples will be taken from the most promising rocks for eventual return to Earth.

The rover carries two microphones.

READ MORE: Mars rover's giant parachute carried secret message

One already has captured the sounds of wind and rock-zapping lasers, the other was meant to record the descent and landing.

This second mike didn't pick up any sounds of the rover's arrival at Mars, but managed to record the first test drive on March 4.

The driving audio contains a unexpected high-pitched scratching noise, according to NASA.

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Engineers are trying to figure it out.

Before it starts drilling into rocks for core samples, Perseverance will drop off an experimental tag-along helicopter, named Ingenuity.

The helicopter will attempt the first powered, controlled flight on another planet sometime next month.

A man who killed his niece has had two years added to his minimum sentence by a judge who said he should have been sentenced to life for his sadistic crime.

Derek Barrett was jailed in 2017 for at least 34.5 years for stabbing Mengmei Leng in her bedroom at their Campsie home before he tossed her body into a blowhole on the Central Coast.

Four years after the crime, a woman found her mother clutching a USB device in her Strathfield home.

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When she saw it contained graphic photos and videos, she handed it to police who identified Barrett in the vision.

Justice Helen Wilson said it was clear Ms Leng was "shocked and alarmed" by Barrett's entry into her bedroom and her struggle afterwards.

"Ms Leng's personal integrity was cruelly defiled by an offender who took pleasure in hurting, humiliating and degrading her." 

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"It occurred because the offender deliberately gave vent to his perverted and sexually sadistic desires, assaulting and degrading Ms Leng for his own depraved enjoyment."

"Too frequently men – and it is almost always men – treat women as no more than an object to be used for sexual gratification, disregarding the rights of women to personal integrity and choice."

"The offender must serve as an example to others that this attitude is very wrong."

Barrett bound, gagged and photographed his niece in their unit in the Sydney suburb of Campsie in 2016.

Then after two days, he stabbed her 40 times.

He then dumped Ms Leng's body in a blowhole at Snapper Point on the NSW Central Coast.

READ MORE: 'Barrett strikes me as a psychopath': Court reporter's view

Her naked body was spotted by a tourist three days later.

Barrett's wife had been away the weekend of the murder.

He told his trial he had no memory of the attack and was high on ice and synthetic cannabis at the time.

Justice Wilson said if the full extent of his crime was known in 2017, a life sentence would have been imposed.

"That sentence cannot now be imposed," she said because of a key legal principle.

She imposed a minimum of 12 years behind bars to be served almost entirely at the same time as his current sentence.

He will be eligible for parole in 2052.

New Zealand could decide as soon as Monday to open a quarantine-free travel bubble with Australia from mid-April.

It is understood a paper is currently being discussed in a NZ Cabinet committee around the final form of the bubble, and that a meeting of the full Cabinet could make decisions early in the next week.

The decision is expected to be signalled in the coming week, for a mid-April start.

READ MORE: Australia-Singapore travel bubble could be live in months

A bubble would open up quarantine-free travel within New Zealand and Australia, while each country would retain the right to halt such travel as it sees fit.

Airports would be divided into "green zones" and "red zones".

Green zones would be free and open travel, while red zones would be for travellers coming from elsewhere in the world to transit or quarantine.

Even a decision as soon as Monday would give a tight turnaround.

NZ COVID-19 Recovery Minister Chris Hipkins told Parliament yesterday that Auckland airport would require 10 days to be ready for the bubble, while the airlines have indicated that they would require three weeks to get geared up and ready to fly.

Other NZ airports that are understood to be participating in the bubble arrangement are Wellington, Christchurch and Queenstown.

The NZ Government is also buoyed by the fact that all border workers should be fully vaccinated by the end of the month and that as the vaccine rolls out further, it will become even tougher for coronavirus to escape from airports and quarantine facilities.

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New Zealanders should also expect that any travel to Australia will come with a warning: that you may have to hunker down in the unlucky instance that a cluster breaks out, and you are caught in the middle of it.

Most likely, however, it is envisaged that unless a Kiwi or an Australian is caught in the centre of a cluster, there would be a three-day shutdown while the situation was assessed, and then travel could potentially resume for most people.

READ MORE: Australia suspends flights from PNG as COVID-19 support announced

Earlier this week, Australian Minister for Trade and Tourism Dan Tehan flagged a three-way travel bubble with Singapore and New Zealand by the middle of the year, with Fiji also keen to join.

Negotiations between Australia and New Zealand appear to have moved quickly since February.

As Stuff reported last month, officials had concluded 11 rounds of talks with Australia over a joint decision-making framework that would govern the bubble.

Under this arrangement there was going to be an agreed set of circumstances that would govern so-called 'green zone' travel rules between the two countries.

Because the bubble will now be a unilateral arrangement, Australia will have to remove its ban on Australians travelling to New Zealand, in order to make it reciprocal.

READ MORE: How to get your half-price flight, and every discounted route

Currently, the only Australian states allowing quarantine-free travel from New Zealand are Victoria and NSW.

But it should be expected that once the Australian Federal Government – which governs the national border and aviation laws – opens the border up that most states will fall into line. Queensland in particular is heavily reliant on the tourist dollar.

– reported with Stuff

A lucky photographer captured an amazing shot of a giant manta ray that leaped out of the water as he was taking pictures of surfers from a Florida beach.

Rusty Escandell told CNN that he took the photograph on Sunday, while spending the day with family and friends at a beach near Officers Club Beach at Patrick Space Force Base, but he didn't realise it until he got home.

"I kind of saw a splash behind the surfer, but didn't think much of it," he said. "It could have been a fish, could have been anything."

READ MORE: The stunning find archeologists made after abseiling to 'Cave of Horror'

Mr Escandell had taken a burst of photos that showed the ray breaching out of the water.

"It was pretty amazing," he said.

His daughter and her boyfriend are both marine biologists and said they'd seen some manta rays in the water after he took the photo, Mr Escandell said.

Mr Escandell owns an auto repair shop and lives in nearby Satellite Beach, and said he enjoys taking pictures at the beach fairly regularly.

He didn't know the surfer in the photo, but they've talked since the photo went viral.

"He's excited too," Mr Escandell said.

Giant manta rays are the world's largest rays and can grow to a wingspan of up to 8.8 metres.

The slow-swimming, migratory fish are listed as threatened under the US Endangered Species Act and as endangered on the IUCN Red List.

"Their populations are declining worldwide," Jessica Pate, a senior scientist at the Marine Megafauna Foundation, said.

Ms Pate told CNN that about 50 people have sent her Mr Escandell's photo over the last few days.

She's just started studying why adult manta rays aggregate off of central and north Florida in the spring.

On Sunday, she spotted 64 adult giant manta rays while conducting an aerial survey of the area between Sebastian and Daytona Beach – which includes Satellite Beach.

"I'm not sure exactly what's driving this large aggregation," Ms Pate said.

"It could be for mating, it could be for feeding, it could be for both.

"But that's what we're going to conduct a study to figure out."

She said it's also not known why giant manta rays breach, or jump out of the water, it could be a mating ritual, they could be trying to dislodge parasites, or it could be a way of communicating because it makes a loud sound.

– reported with CNN

Executive news producers Annalise Bolt and Lydia Bilton got their start in the Nine newsroom thanks to the Jacoby-Walkley Scholarship. Here is why they recommend the experience to aspiring broadcast journalists.

It's 1am. The smell of Nescafe Blend 43 is in the air. We're both bleary eyed and discussing how many hours of sleep we managed to get before rolling out of bed. We're on the Today show news desk and anything could happen. It sounds cliché but it's true.

From Covid lockdowns, to elections, the bushfire crisis, the storming of the Capitol in Washington DC, to the burning down of the Notre Dame cathedral and royal babies – we've covered some of Australia's and the world's biggest stories in our time at Nine.

As a student, it can seem incredibly daunting to get a start in this highly competitive industry. But this scholarship is the ultimate leg up. Opportunities like this are unfortunately few and far between and every young journalist should jump at it

The atmosphere in the newsroom when a big story breaks is electric. While the hours are tough, it is the best training ground for a young journalist and it would never have happened for both of us without the Jacoby Walkley Scholarship. It pulled us out of the lecture theatre and threw us into the centre of one of the biggest newsrooms in Australia.

In our respective years, we were both given incredible hands on experience which taught us more about news than any university tutorial. From shadowing reporters, to writing scripts, attending media conferences, conducting interviews and working with camera operators and editors – it was a crash course in broadcast journalism.

It also gave us access to some of the best mentors in the business, which is invaluable. We both made connections during our time on the scholarship which we still have today. By the end of our internships, we both had been offered jobs and it ultimately paved the way to the careers we love today. We now both work as executive producers at Nine and have had experience as reporters – and we still credit the Jacoby Walkley Scholarship as giving us that initial foot in the door.

There's so much more to TV news than being in front of the camera. We've both worked as producers and reporters but there's also so many other roles which are crucial to creating the final product. From our talented graphic artists, to editors, social media, camera operators and studio crew – all who share a love for news. The beauty of this scholarship is you get to experience all of these departments and tailor the internship to your interests and ambitions.

As a student, it can seem incredibly daunting to get a start in this highly competitive industry. But this scholarship is the ultimate leg up. Opportunities like this are unfortunately few and far between and every young journalist should jump at it.

Applications are open now for the 2021 Jacoby-Walkley Scholarship with Nine. Aspiring broadcast journalists aged 28 and under are encouraged to apply by Monday April 26 Click here for more details.

An accused Gold Coast criminal has lived a real-life example of out of the frying pan and into the fire.

The man jumped off the street and straight into police headquarters.

CCTV captures him throwing his backpack over a fence and into the Surfers Paradise police headquarters, just as a police car drives slowly past.

Within seconds, he follows his bag and gets confronted by two detectives.

"What an idiot. Really? He jumped into the police HQ? Oh, that's brilliant," one passerby said.

Tradesmen filming the incident from a nearby rooftop were just as amused.

Police searched the bag and allegedly found amphetamines, GHB, syringes, scales and a pipe before charging the man with drug possession and trespassing.

The 28-year-old from Biggera Waters on the Gold Coast wasn't even being hunted by police when he spotted officers on another job and took off.

Officers had been patrolling Budds Beach in the Surfers Paradise canals after finding a stolen Toyota SUV dumped on nearby Oak Avenue.