Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltechīuilt with many “off-the-shelf” components, such as smartphone processors and cameras, Ingenuity is now 23 Earth months and more than 45 flights beyond its expected lifetime. So it’s imperative Ingenuity keeps up and is in the lead whenever possible.” NASA’s Perseverance rover is visible at upper left in this aerial view from the Ingenuity helicopter flying over a dried-up river delta at Jezero Crater. The rover team has a job to do and a schedule to keep. “If the rover gets too far ahead or disappears behind a hill, we could lose communications. “Ingenuity relies on Perseverance to act as a communications relay between it and mission controllers here at JPL,” explained Josh Anderson, Ingenuity operations lead at NASA’s JPL in California. “Just as the Wright brothers continued their experiments well after that momentous day at Kitty Hawk in 1903, the Ingenuity team continues to pursue and learn from the flight operations of the first aircraft on another world,” said Lori Glaze, director of the planetary science division at NASA Headquarters in Washington.īeyond facing more challenging terrain, Ingenuity will also now fly at a greater frequency in the coming weeks because the helicopter needs to remain within electronic earshot of Perseverance, which with its AutoNav capability can travel hundreds of meters each day. It also serves as an “airborne” scout for Perseverance - which is searching for evidence of past microbial life and collecting samples for future return to Earth - and its successful test of powered flight on another world could aid in future sample return missions from Mars. Ingenuity is no longer a simple technology demonstrator but has become an integral part of Perseverance’s operations. Since then the helicopter has far exceeded its originally planned technology demonstration mission of up to five flights.Īt the outset, engineers hoped Ingenuity would be able to show that a solar-powered drone could function in the extremely thin atmosphere of Mars – but the experiment has ended up wildly exceeding expectations. The Mars helicopter’s first flight took place on April 19, 2021, some two months after it landed attached to the Perseverance rover in Jezero Crater. To counteract this, Ingenuity is equipped with enlarged, specially shaped blades that rotate about 10 times faster than what is needed to fly on Earth. Ingenuity is the first machine to achieve powered flight across the skies of an alien world – a significant accomplishment given that the thin Martian atmosphere makes it difficult to achieve lift. Perseverance took the opportunity to snap a series of closeup photos which show the helicopter’s rotors coated in Martian dust that was likely kicked up by Ingenuity during takeoff, hovering and landing maneuvers. Ingenuity’s historic 50th flight took place on April 13, when it flew 1,057 feet (322.2 meters) in just under three minutes and reached a record altitude of 59 feet (18 meters) before descending into Belva Crater, which stretches for about half a mile.įive days later, its mothership the Perseverance rover, which carried Ingenuity to Mars in 2021, traveled to within only 75 feet (23 meters) of the helicopter, its closest ever approach in the mission to date. NASA’s pioneering Mars helicopter Ingenuity continues to outperform its design specifications, having now notched up more than 50 record-breaking forays across the Red Planet’s surface, 10 times as many flights as originally planned for. This view shows dust accumulation on the vehicle. Unlike drones on Earth, Ingenuity operates entirely autonomously based on a set of preprogrammed instructions and using its cameras and sensors to stay on track.NASA’s Perseverance rover glimpsed the Ingenuity helicopter earlier this month after the rotorcraft’s 50th flight. The Ingenuity helicopter was a last-minute addition to NASA's Perseverance rover, which landed on the Red Planet in February.īuilt over three years at a cost of $US80 million ($105 million) from high-tech and off-the-shelf components, the helicopter had a singular mission: to prove it could fly. More high-resolution images are expected over the next few days as all the data flows back to Earth.

'We've been talking for so long about our Wright brothers moment, and here it is.' 'We can confirm it has made its first flight on Mars,' Ingenuity project manager MiMi Aung said.

Just minutes later, video footage from the Perseverance rover, captured from its vantage point 65 metres away, showed the successful flight, which reached a height of approximately 3m. The NASA team watched at command headquarters as the first data, which included a grainy black and white image, confirmed the flight was successful.Īn image from the helicopter sent back to Earth showed the surface of Mars with a shadow of the aircraft.