Ingenuity is a small robotic helicopter located on Mars since February 18, 2021. It successfully completed the first powered controlled flight on April 19, 2021, taking off vertically, hovering and landing. The small helicopter rose three meters and stayed aloft 39.1 seconds before returning to the surface of Mars.
Part of NASA's Mars 2020 mission, the small coaxial, drone rotorcraft is serving as a technology demonstrator for the potential use of flying probes on other worlds, and will have the potential to scout locations of interest and support the future planning of driving routes for Mars rovers.
EarthSky says NASA’s Mars helicopter Ingenuity successfully flew in the thin air of Mars on April 19, 2021. The team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California reportedly broke into cheers as flight controllers announced the success of this first demonstration flight.
It was the first powered, guided flight on another planet. Expected to follow are a handful of other test flights over a month-long campaign that aims to show that aerial exploration is feasible in Mars’ thin atmosphere.
Ingenuity is reportedly expected to fly up to five times during its 30-day test campaign scheduled early in the rover's mission. Primarily technology demonstrations, each flight is planned to fly at altitudes ranging from 3–5 m above the ground for up to 90 seconds each.
Ingenuity, which can travel up to 50 m downrange and then back to the starting area, will use autonomous control during its short flights, which will be telerobotically planned and scripted by operators at JPL. It will communicate directly with the Perseverance rover after each landing. Its rotor blades were successfully unlocked on April 8, 2021, days after it detached from Perseverance.
