NASA’s Mars helicopter succeeds in historic first flight
WASHINGTON (AFP) - NASA successfully flew its mini helicopter Ingenuity on Mars early Monday, the first powered flight on another planet and a feat the agency likened to ‘’our Wright brothers moment.’’
The four pound (1.8 kilogram) rotorcraft lifted off at 3:34 am Eastern Time (0734 GMT), rose to a height of 10 feet (three meters), swiveled its tissue-box sized body, swayed in a gentle Martian breeze and then touched down after 39.1 seconds.
Data and images from the flight were transmitted 173 million miles (278 million kilometers) back to Earth where they were received by NASA’s array of ground antennas and processed almost three-and-a-half hours later.
Engineers in orange polo shirts were glued to their screens at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, where the mission had been planned for the past six years.
They broke into cheers as one of them read off a checklist of maneuvers Ingenuity had successfully executed, and concluded: ‘’Ingenuity has performed its first flight -- the first flight of a powered aircraft on another planet.’’
The aircraft quickly sent back a grayscale image from its downward pointing navigation camera, showing its bug-like shadow cast on the surface.
Then came a choppy color video from the Perseverance rover showing Ingenuity on the ground, in flight, and once more at rest. A smoother version followed a few hours later.
‘’We’ve been talking so long about our Wright brothers moment on Mars, and here it is,’’ said Ingenuity project manager MiMi Aung to her team, ripping up her contingency plan.
The first powered flight on Earth was achieved by the Wright brothers on the sand dunes of the Outer Banks in North Carolina in 1903, ushering in the era of aviation.
A swatch of fabric from that plane has been wrapped around a cable under Ingenuity’s solar panel in honor of the feat.
Bob Balaram, Ingenuity’s chief engineer, told reporters the helicopter was in fine fettle following the maiden run.
‘’She’s even healthier than she was before this flight -- she shook off some of her dust that had been covering the solar panels, and is in fact producing even more solar energy than before.’’