When NASA Mars Perseverance robber lands on the red planet later this month, it will arrive with a lot of precious cargo. Among the brand new technology is a drone that will be the first to ever fly on another planet: the Helicopter ingenuity.
Ingenuity is essentially a test flight – it experiments with flights on another planet for the first time and has limited capabilities. It only weighs about 4 pounds, but its success will no doubt pave the way more ambitious exploration from the red planet.
“The Wright brothers showed that powered flight into Earth’s atmosphere was possible using an experimental aircraft,” Håvard Grip, Ingenuity’s lead pilot at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), said in a statement. “With Ingenuity we are trying to do the same for Mars.”
The rover has no scientific instruments to support it Persistence, and is considered a completely separate mission from the rover. It’s currently in Perseverance’s belly, but won’t emerge until after the duo landed on Mars on Feb. 18.
NASA / JPL-Caltech
Flying on Mars versus Earth
Mars’ thin atmosphere, which is 99% less dense than Earth’s, will make it difficult for Ingenuity to achieve enough lift to fly properly. Hence, it is designed to be extremely light. It is only 19 inches long.
The helicopter has four large carbon fiber blades, formed into two rotors spanning about four feet and spinning in opposite directions at about 2,400 rpm – significantly faster than typical helicopters on Earth.
Additionally, the Jezero Crater, Perseverance’s landing site, is extremely cold – temperatures drop to minus-130 degrees Fahrenheit at night. Much of Ingenuity’s power goes directly to keeping it warm rather than the flight itself.
Flight controllers at JPL cannot control Ingenuity while it is actually flying. Due to significant communication delays, pre-flight commands are sent and the team doesn’t know how the flight went until it’s over. Ingenuity will be able to make its own decisions about how to fly and keep itself warm.
“This is technology that will really open up a new mode of exploration for us, just like the rovers did 20 years ago when we flew Sojourner for the first mission to Mars,” said Matt Wallace, deputy Mars 2020 project manager at JPL, said last week. during a press conference.
Perseverance carries over two dozen cameras, and Ingenuity has two of its own. Here on Earth, we have a view of the front row of Ingenuity’s test flights from the perspective of the rover, as well as aerial footage from the helicopter itself.
NASA / JPL-Caltech
What’s in a name?
The Ingenuity name was originally submitted by Alabama high school student Vaneeza Rupani for the Mars 2020 rover, which was eventually named Persistence. But the NASA team thought it would be the perfect name for a helicopter that took so much creative thinking to get off the ground.
“The ingenuity and brilliance of people who work hard to overcome the challenges of interplanetary travel allow us to experience the wonders of space exploration,” Rupani wrote. “Ingenuity is what enables people to achieve great things.”
Twenty-eight thousand students in the US submitted essays and suggested names for NASA’s latest Mars rover. Virginia seventh-grader Alexander Mather’s suggestion, Perseverance, was eventually chosen.
Ingenuity has yet to take flight
The NASA team has a list of milestones for the helicopter to survive before it ever takes off on Mars:
- Survival of the launch from Cape Canaveral, which took place on July 30; the journey to Mars; and landing on February 18th
- Safe bets to the surface from the belly of perseverance
- Autonomously keeping itself warm during the harsh Martian nights with the help of internal heaters
- Autonomous charging with a solar panel
After all this, Ingenuity will take off for the first time, hovering above the ground for about 20 to 30 seconds before landing. If it makes a successful first flight, the team will attempt up to four other tests within a month, each gradually pushing the limits of distance and height, like a baby bird learning to fly.
“The Ingenuity helicopter is a high-risk, high-reward enterprise,” said Wallace. “It’s something we haven’t tried and there will always be a chance of a problem. But that’s why we do it – we’ll learn from the problem if it arises.”
United Launch Alliance
Adding a component of aerial reconnaissance could be crucial for future planetary exploration.
“The Ingenuity team has gone to great lengths to test the helicopter on Earth and we look forward to flying our real-world experiment on Mars,” said MiMi Aung, Ingenuity’s project manager at JPL. “We will learn along the way, and it will be the ultimate reward for our team for adding a new dimension to the way we explore other worlds in the future.”
Helicopters on future Mars missions could act as robotic explorers, viewing terrain from above that rovers cannot reach, or as spacecraft with scientific instruments. They may even help future astronauts to explore the red planet one day.
But before this can happen, persistence must “seven minutes of terrorwhich includes its entry, descent and landing on Mars. NASA will live stream the historic event on its website Feb. 18, starting at 2:15 p.m. ET.