WASHINGTON - NASA's Ingenuity mini-helicopter has been dropped on the surface of Mars in preparation for its first flight, the U.S. space agency said.
The ultra-light aircraft had been fixed to the belly of the Perseverance rover, which touched down on the Red Planet on February 18.
"Its 293 million mile (471 million kilometer) journey aboard @NASAPersevere ended with the final drop of 4 inches (10 centimeter) from the rover's belly to the surface of Mars today. Next milestone? Survive the night."
And were you following this?
Sensors Collect Crucial Data on Mars Landings With Arrival of Perseverance – NASA's Mars
MEDLI2 was one of the crucial technologies onboard the rover’s protective aeroshell that helped document the entry, descent, and landing of the spacecraft.
MEDLI2’s role was to collect critical data about the harsh environment during Perseverance’s entry through the planet’s atmosphere. It included three types of sensors – thermocouples, heat flux sensors, and pressure transducers – that measured extreme heat and pressure during entry. It also contained electronics and hardware for recording the thermal and pressure loads experienced during entry and through the parachute deployment.
NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Gets Set for Historic First Flight on Another World - WSJ
In a hardscrabble crater on Mars, a tiny helicopter with a smartphone brain is now days away from attempting the first powered flight on another world. NASA hopes its spindly robot copter, named Ingenuity, will prove that powered flight is possible in the perilously thin Martian air and help usher in a new era of planetary exploration in which drones play a vital role.
The brief excursion—one of five planned for a one-month period expected to start on or about April 11—is a short hop by the measures of interplanetary travel. But agency officials said it would be a giant leap for Mars exploration. In the future, they said, autonomous drones like Ingenuity could take to the skies to explore canyons, ice caps and other terrain that is inaccessible to rovers. Should human explorers ever land on Mars, drones could serve as scouts and aerial sensors.
NASA's InSight Detects Two Sizable Quakes on Mars – NASA's Mars Exploration Program
InSight Starts Burying Seismometer’s Cable: NASA’s InSight lander used a scoop on its robotic arm to begin trickling soil over the cable connecting its seismometer to the spacecraft on March 14, 2021, the 816th Martian day, or sol of the mission. Scientists hope insulating it from the wind will make it easier to detect marsquakes. Full image and caption ›
The magnitude 3.3 and 3.1 temblors originated in a region called Cerberus Fossae, further supporting the idea that this location is seismically active.
What did we miss?
China's Tianwen-1 spacecraft captures stunning crescent Mars photos | Space
China's Tianwen-1 spacecraft has captured stunning images of Mars as a bright red sunlit crescent in deep space.
The photographs were separately taken over the northern and southern hemispheres of Mars with the medium resolution camera on Tianwen-1, China's first interplanetary mission.
The result is two glorious shots showing the illuminated eastern hemisphere of Mars, including surface features and the faint edge of the Martian atmosphere. The photographs were taken at a distance of around 6,850 miles (11,000 kilometers) away from Mars.
What's up with this weird green rock on Mars? Perseverance rover is trying to find out. | Space
Perseverance's laser hasn't yet penetrated the mystery of a strange Martian rock near the rover's new digs.
"Is it something weathered out of the local bedrock?," a tweet the account posted on Wednesday (March 31) wondered. "Is it a piece of Mars plopped into the area from a far-flung impact event? Is it a meteorite? Or something else?"
Video: Perseverance lasers odd rock and new Mars panorama in latest pics
Related: Where to find the latest Mars photos from NASA's Perseverance rover
Hydrated crust stores Mars' missing water | Science
Mars is an arid and cold planet. Its surface water is found mainly as polar ice because of the low temperature. The amount of ice is far smaller than that of Earth's seawater by about three orders of magnitude. In a unit used in the community, the total volume is ∼20 to 40 m global equivalent layer (GEL). However, Mars exploration missions have found plenty of evidence for a large amount of liquid water that shaped the Mars landscape.
NICK STROBEL: Mars exploration, dark matter making headlines | Entertainment | bakersfield.com
Happy Easter! This is the last day of BC's spring break and with everyone 16 years and older eligible for vaccination by April 15, there's reasonable hope that we'll be able to have face-to-face hybrid classes starting in the summer.
Sometime this week we might see the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter take flight. The NASA news item said that April 8 was the earliest that an attempt would be made.
On another part of Mars, the Curiosity rover continued its exploration of the Mount Sharp formation in Gale Crater. NASA recently released several images including a 360-degree panorama and selfie. Curiosity is now entering an area with sulfate-rich minerals that might reveal what happened to Mars as it transitioned from the warm, water-rich world to the super-cold desert world of today.
Happening on Twitter
#MarsHelicopter touchdown confirmed! Its 293 million mile (471 million km) journey aboard @NASAPersevere ended with… https://t.co/mMjPwZiXBa NASAJPL (from Pasadena, Calif.) Sun Apr 04 01:04:25 +0000 2021
Did you know that Burmese-American engineer MiMi Aung led the development of the @NASAPersevere mission's helicopte… https://t.co/41PGMgYbTF eAsiaMediaHub (from Asia Pacific) Sun Apr 04 10:29:25 +0000 2021
Soon @NASA will attempt the first powered, controlled flight on another planet! Ingenuity #MarsHelicopter has had a… https://t.co/EpmyRAtbSH Dr_ThomasZ (from Washington, DC) Sat Apr 03 16:11:08 +0000 2021
NASA's Mars helicopter Ingenuity touches down on the Red Planet https://t.co/sa9h7uMApY https://t.co/CgZl1hBjoY SPACEdotcom (from NYC) Sun Apr 04 04:52:03 +0000 2021
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