NASA's Perseverance rover is slowly getting ready to deploy the first helicopter on Mars even as it takes a look back at the litter it's dropping on the Red Planet.
The rover, which was carefully sterilized on Earth to avoid contaminating Mars with microbes, dropped a protective debris shield onto the planet's surface on March 21. The shield is no longer needed as it was designed to protect Ingenuity during the "seven minutes of terror" landing in February.
An image from the WATSON (Wide Angle Topographic Sensor for Operations and engineering) camera on the rover's robotic arm shows the debris shield safely on the surface of Jezero Crater, between the rover's six wheels. It's the second thing Perseverance dropped in recent weeks, after an unneeded belly pan relating to its sampling system.
Video: Perseverance rover's latest tracks & Mars 'litter' (with Sol 16 audio)
"Away goes the debris shield, and here's our first look at the helicopter," the Perseverance Twitter account tweeted March 21.
In a series of images from Perseverance, the Mars helicopter can be seen slowly unfolding from its initial position on the rover's belly.
"It [the helicopter] is stowed sideways, folded up and locked in place, so there's some reverse origami to do before I can set it down. First though, I'll be off to the designated 'helipad,' a couple days' drive from here," Perseverance team members wrote on Twitter as the rover.
The Ingenuity helicopter is expected to attempt its first flight as soon as April 8, according to NASA, and it will be the first time an aircraft will attempt to fly through another world's atmosphere. "A couple more drives should get me there," the tweet added.
The rover is on a larger quest to seek signs of habitability in Jezero Crater, which appears to have been rich in water earlier in its history. Perseverance will cache the most promising samples it finds for a future sample-return mission to ferry back to Earth. As for Ingenuity, if it can fly it will hail a potential new generation of Martian explorers that can scout ahead of rovers and even humans, in the decades to come, to make surface exploration easier.
NASA plans to start the Ingenuity flight campaign no earlier than April 8, assuming that Perseverance will be able to deploy the helicopter safely on the surface a complicated six-sol or Martian day process. (A sol is roughly 24 hours, 40 minutes of Earth time.) Perseverance and Ingenuity are also working mostly on their own, as radio communications must send preprogrammed instructions to Mars, which is several minutes' light speed away from us.
Perseverance teams are working on Mars time for a few months to make the most of the mission start, and hope to get Ingenuity off the ground within 30 sols or 31 Earth days of the drone's deployment.
Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.
Excerpt from:
NASA's Mars helicopter is slowly unfolding beneath the Perseverance rover - Space.com
- NASA's Curiosity Mars Rover Reached the South Side of Pinnacle Ridge What's Next? - SciTechDaily - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- One Horse Spun and Three Withdrawals at MARS Badminton Final Horse Inspection - Eventing Nation - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Get ready for the Jupiter and Mars conjunction before dawn - EarthSky - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- "Mars One Thousand One" at the City of Science of Tunis - US Embassy in Tunisia - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- The 2024 Humans to Mars Summit is happening now. Here's how to watch live. - Space.com - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- These Rocks Formed in an Ancient Lake on Mars - Universe Today - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- NASA's Plans for Next-Generation Mars Helicopters Are Up in the Air - Scientific American - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Venus looked a lot like Earth when they first formed - NPR - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- A journey to Mars in just two months: a revolutionary rocket engine is invented - The Universe. Space. Tech - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- New Thomas Mars Chess Bot On Chess.com - Chess.com - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- We Need to Consider Conservation Efforts on Mars - Universe Today - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- How fungi and bacteria could help build habitats on Mars - Modern Ghana - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- A Laser Zapped the Rocks on Mars and Revealed a Long-Lost Water World - Popular Mechanics - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Mayan Intercropping Could Be Key to Food on Mars - Newser - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Jared Leto on 'emotional time travel' of singing Thirty Seconds to Mars hits on new tour - ABC News - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Mars Hill seeks input from residents on new bike and pedestrian path - Citizen Times - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- T-Minus: New SpaceX fashion, a Mars mystery, and more - Freethink - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Nasa reveals rocket that can travel to Mars in 2 months - The News International - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- NASA wants to build a new rocket that could get to Mars in just 2 months - Quartz - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- This is how NASA is preparing to protect its astronauts on Mars from solar flares - Deseret News - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- MICK MARS Wanted To Do Something 'Different' With His Debut Solo Album: I Didn't Want It To Sound Like '1980s Music' - BLABBERMOUTH.NET - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Mars invests $47 million in sustainable dairy initiative - Food Business News - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Will SpaceX's Innovation Save NASA's Mars Mission? - SciTechDaily - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- The 2024 MARS Badminton Field: At A Glance - Eventing Nation - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Mars may have been more Earth-like than we thought, discovery of oxygen-rich rocks reveals - Livescience.com - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- ENs Ultimate Guide to the 2024 MARS Badminton Horse Trials - Eventing Nation - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Abigail Allwood Doing Mars Rover Astrobiology Fieldwork in Greenland - Astrobiology - Astrobiology News - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- See Ingenuitys Flight Map: 72 Helicopter Flights on Mars - Science@NASA - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Bob Jones, Hartselle and Mars Hill baseball advance to state championship series - WHNT News 19 - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- EXOs D.O. Turns Up the Passion on Mars: Song Review - Rolling Stone India - May 13th, 2024 [May 13th, 2024]
- Scientist explains the weird stuff that would happen to the first humans who live on Mars - UNILAD - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Heating Mars On The Cheap - Hackaday - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Elon Musk just gave another Mars speechthis time the vision seems tangible - Ars Technica - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Thousands of strange white rocks found on Mars. Will they ever be brought to Earth? - Space.com - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Could microbes feed astronauts on Mars? - Sciworthy - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Elon Musk to send a million people to Mars - AzerNews.Az - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Bruno Mars Announced as L.A.s Intuit Dome Grand Opening Performer - Hollywood Reporter - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- L.A. Clippers New Intuit Dome Will See Bruno Mars As Its Opening Act - Deadline - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- NASA's Curiosity Mars rover begins exploring possible dried-up Red Planet river - Space.com - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- NASA`s Perseverance rover spots thousands of `unusual` white rocks on Mars - WION - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- For Elon Musk and His Disciples, Mars Is Heaven - The Catholic Thing - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Mission to Mars? Vertical Future to develop prototype for growing crops in space - BusinessGreen - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- SpaceX plans to leave the first humans on Mars stranded with no way home - TweakTown - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Astrophysicist called the colonization of Mars a dangerous illusion - The Universe. Space. Tech - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Bruno Mars Announced as Intuit Dome's Grand Opening Performer With Two Shows in Los Angeles on August 15 and 16 - Business Wire - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Mars may not have had liquid water long enough for life to form - Ars Technica - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- NASA Crashed a Spacecraft Into an Asteroid and There Could Be Some Consequences - Popular Mechanics - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Madison board to vote on Mars Hill wedding venue, 1st since event venue moratorium - Citizen Times - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Want to Start a Farm on Mars? This Rover Will Find Out if it's Possible - Universe Today - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Bruno Mars will open the new Intuit Dome in Inglewood with 2 shows in August - Daily Breeze - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- The Vanguard of the Red Planet: Understanding the Drive Behind Mars Colonization - yTech - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- New insights into Mars' vanishing water mystery from Curiosity rover - Earth.com - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Bruno Mars announced as grand opening act of Inglewood's new Intuit Dome - FOX 11 Los Angeles - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Mars and FAO Food Safety Partnership Targets Mycotoxins - Food Digital - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Preparing for the Psychological Journey to Mars: Innovative Research on Astronaut Well-being - yTech - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- NASA May Have Inadvertently Redirected An Asteroid At Mars - IFLScience - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- NASA mission sparks 'space billiards' as boulders head toward Mars - Gwinnettdailypost.com - April 8th, 2024 [April 8th, 2024]
- Giant Mars asteroid impact creates vast field of destruction with 2 billion craters - Space.com - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- NASA's attempt to bring home part of Mars is unprecedented: The mission's problems are not - Phys.org - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Mars Spacecraft Marks 25,000 Orbits With Volcanoes, Clouds And A Moon - Forbes - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- NASA smashed an asteroid with a rocket. The debris could hit Mars. - National Geographic - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Elon Musk Says 'Almost Anyone' Can Afford A $100,000 Ticket To Mars By Working And Saving But 57% Of People ... - Yahoo Finance - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Mars Mysteries: Unveiling the Icy Craters - NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Future Mars plane could help solve Red Planet methane mystery (exclusive) - Space.com - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Sols 4137-4138: Fascinated by Fascination Turret! NASA Mars Exploration - NASA Mars Exploration - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Drilling for water ice on Mars: How close are we to making it happen? - Space.com - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- This Summer, Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Grateful Deads From the Mars Hotel - Rolling Stone - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Bruno Mars and Las Vegas from those MGM debt rumours to his new bar - Style - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Mars using Ansys software to transform packaging development - Recycling Today - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Mars as a Driver of Deep-Sea Erosion - Eos - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- A Song of Ice and Tectonics - NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Mars Hill students, faculty join residents to mourn 10 campus trees ahead of removal - Citizen Times - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Grateful Dead From The Mars Hotel (50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition) - Shore Fire Media - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Texas will be the launchpad for Mars: Governor announces board of directors for Texas Space Commission - KWTX - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- M&Ms and Snickers parent company Mars spending $70M to open an 'innovation lab' in NJ - NorthJersey.com - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Historic water bomber, Hawaii Martin Mars, to be displayed in BC museum - The Nelson Daily - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals (SHERLOC) - NASA - NASA Mars Exploration - March 29th, 2024 [March 29th, 2024]
- This little rover will ride shotgun on Japan's ambitious Mars moon sample-return mission - Space.com - March 6th, 2024 [March 6th, 2024]
- Lawmakers announce caucus focused on space and planetary science - NBC News - March 6th, 2024 [March 6th, 2024]
- The science value of Mars Sample Return - The Planetary Society - March 6th, 2024 [March 6th, 2024]