NASA’s
Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Completes First One-Way Trip
The Red Planet
rotorcraft headed south in support of furthering research into the
potential use of aerial scouts on Mars in the future.
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter
completed its fifth flight on the Red Planet today with its first one-way
journey from Wright Brothers Field to an airfield 423 feet (129 meters) to
the south. After arrival above its new airfield, Ingenuity climbed to an
altitude record of 33 feet (10 meters) and captured high-resolution color
images of its new neighborhood before touching down.
The flight represents the rotorcraft’s
transition to its new operations demonstration phase. This phase will focus
on investigating what kind of capabilities a rotorcraft operating from Mars
can provide. Examples include scouting, aerial observations of areas not
accessible by a rover, and detailed stereo imaging from atmospheric
altitudes. These operations and the lessons learned from them could
significantly benefit future aerial exploration of Mars and other worlds.
“The fifth flight of the Mars Helicopter
is another great achievement for the agency,” said Bob Pearce, associate
administrator for NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate. “The
continuing success of Ingenuity proves the value of bringing together the
strengths of diverse skill sets from across the agency to create the
future, like flying an aircraft on another planet!”
The flight began at 3:26 p.m. EDT
(12:26 p.m. PDT, 12:33 p.m. local Mars time) and lasted 108 seconds. The
Ingenuity team chose the new landing site based on information gathered
during the previous
flight – the first “aerial scout” operation on another world – which
enabled them to generate digital elevation maps indicating almost
completely flat terrain with almost no obstructions.
“We bid adieu to our first Martian
home, Wright Brothers Field, with grateful thanks for the support it
provided to the historic first flights of a planetary rotorcraft,” said Bob
Balaram, chief engineer for Ingenuity Mars Helicopter at JPL. “No matter
where we go from here, we will always carry with us a reminder
of how much those two bicycle builders from Dayton meant to us during our
pursuit of the first flight on another world.”
The Wright brothers went on from
proving powered, controlled flight was possible to attempting to better
understand how
the new technology could be employed. In a similar fashion, NASA seeks
to learn more with Ingenuity how operations with next-generation
helicopters could benefit future exploration of the Red Planet. This new
phase will bring added risk to Ingenuity, with more one-way flights and
more precision maneuvering.
Having successfully landed at its new
airfield, Ingenuity will await future instructions, relayed via
Perseverance, from mission controllers. The agency’s fifth rover to the
fourth planet is also heading south, toward a region where it will commence
science operations and sample collection. The rover team’s near-term
strategy doesn’t require long drives that would leave the helicopter far
behind, allowing Ingenuity to continue with this operations demonstration.
“The plan forward is to fly Ingenuity
in a manner that does not reduce the pace of Perseverance science
operations,” said Balaram. “We may get a couple more flights in over the
next few weeks, and then the agency will evaluate how we’re doing. We have
already been able to gather all the flight performance data that we
originally came here to collect. Now, this new operations demo gives us an
opportunity to further expand our knowledge of flying machines on other
planets.”
More About Ingenuity
The Ingenuity Mars Helicopter was built
by JPL, which also manages this technology demonstration project for NASA
Headquarters. It is supported by NASA’s Science, Aeronautics, and Space
Technology mission directorates. NASA’s Ames Research Center in
California’s Silicon Valley and NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton,
Virginia, provided significant flight performance analysis and technical
assistance during Ingenuity’s development. AeroVironment Inc., Qualcomm,
and SolAero also provided design assistance and major vehicle components.
Lockheed Space in designed and manufactured the Mars
Helicopter Delivery System.
At NASA Headquarters, Dave Lavery is
the program executive for the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter. At JPL, MiMi Aung
is the project manager and J. “Bob” Balaram is chief engineer.
For more information about Ingenuity:
https://go.nasa.gov/ingenuity-press-kit
and
https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter
More About Perseverance
A key objective for Perseverance’s
mission on Mars is astrobiology,
including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will
characterize the planet’s geology and past climate, pave the way for human
exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and
cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust).
Subsequent NASA missions, in
cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars
to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth
for in-depth analysis.
The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is
part of NASA’s Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis
missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the
Red Planet.
JPL, which is managed for NASA by
Caltech in Pasadena, California, built and manages operations of the
Perseverance rover.
For more about Perseverance:
nasa.gov/perseverance
and
mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/
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