Ingenuity, the helicopter that sent NASA to Mars, first turned its propellers in a pre-flight test scheduled for Sunday evening, the first on another planet by a powered spacecraft.
“The helicopter is fine, it’s healthy,” Tim Canham, Ingenuity’s operations manager, said at a news conference on Friday.
“Last night … we spun the propellers very slowly and carefully,” he said.
The moment was captured by the Perseverance rover, a few yards away, in which the helicopter had been transported since landing on Mars on Feb. 18, before parting ways last weekend.
NASA has released a short video clip of the spacecraft, similar to a large drone, with spinning propellers.
The maiden flight will take place on Monday at 02:54 GMT (Sunday at 10:54 p.m. on the east coast of the United States), the US space agency announced.
The first data is expected to reach Earth on Monday around 08:15 GMT (04:15 on the East Coast of the United States).
A live feed from NASA teams analyzing this initial data will be visible on the space agency’s website.
The first flight takes a total of 40 seconds and the helicopter will take off vertically before remaining in the air.
“We’re going to take off, go up to ten feet, turn toward the robber, take a picture, then go back down,” Canham announced.
NASA plans up to five flights, which are getting more and more difficult, over a period of one month.
A final propeller test is yet to be performed this Friday, this time “at full speed,” said MiMi Aung, project manager for the helicopter at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
Flying in the sky of Mars is challenging because it has a density that corresponds to only 1% of Earth’s atmosphere.
Although gravity is less there than on Earth, NASA teams had to develop an ultra-light machine (1.8 kg) and its propellers will spin much faster than those of a standard helicopter.
What are the chances of success of this flight? “The only uncertainty remains the Martian environment,” including “the winds,” said MiMi Aung. It’s a “high risk” experience, but with a “big reward” if you are successful, he summed up.