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The solar helicopter

NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter succeeds in its historic first flight.

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NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter succeeds in its historic first flight. On Monday, NASA's Mars ingenuity helicopter became the first aircraft in history to make a controlled motorized flight to another planet. The ingenuity team at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California confirmed that the flight was successful after obtaining data from the helicopter via NASA's Perseverance Mars rover at 6:46 EDT (3:46 PDT). Ingenuity is the latest in a long and legendary tradition of NASA projects that have achieved the goal of space exploration, which was previously considered impossible, "said interim NASA administrator Steve Jurczyk." The X-15 was a pioneer of the space shuttle. Mars Pathfinder and its rover Sojourner have done the same for three generations of Mars rovers. We don't know exactly where ingenuity will take us, but today's results suggest that the sky - at least on Mars - may not be the limit. " The solar helicopter first took off in the air at 3:34 am EDT (12:34 pm PDT) - 12:33 am local average solar time (Mars time) - a time that the Inenuity team determined would have ideal energy and flight conditions. The altimeter data indicates that the ingenuity rose to the maximum prescribed altitude of 3 meters and maintained a constant movement for 30 seconds. He then descended and, after recording a total of 39.1 seconds of flight, touched back to the surface of Mars. More details of the test are expected in the next downlinks. The initial flight intelligence demonstration was autonomous - piloted by on-board instructions, navigation and control systems, executing algorithms developed by the JPL team. Since data must be sent and returned from the Red Planet for hundreds of millions of miles using orbiting satellites and NASA's Deep Space Network, ingenuity could not be piloted with a lever and its flight was not observed from Earth to real time. NASA Associate Administrator for Science Thomas Zurbuchen announced the name of the Martian airfield where the flight took place. "Now, 117 years after the Wright brothers made the first flight to our planet, NASA's Ingenuity helicopter has managed to accomplish this incredible achievement in another world," Zurbuchen said. "While these two iconic moments in aviation history can be separated by time and 173 million miles of space, they will now be forever linked. As a tribute to Dayton's two innovative bicycle manufacturers, this is the first of many aviation fields. in other worlds it will now be known as the Wright Brothers Field, in recognition of the ingenuity and innovation that continue to drive exploration. " The chief pilot of Ingenuity, Håvard Grip, announced that the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) - the United Nations civil aviation agency - has introduced NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration with the official denominator of ICAO IGY, the insignia INGENUITY. "The Mars Helicopter project has moved from the 'blue sky' feasibility study to the applicable engineering concept of achieving the first flight to another world in just over six years," said Michael Watkins, director of JPL. "The fact that this project has achieved such a historic first is a testament to the innovation and research of our team here at JPL, as well as at NASA's Langley and Ames research centers and our industrial partners. It is an excellent example of the kind. thrust technology that thrives on JPL and fits well with NASA's exploration goals.

On Monday, NASA’s Mars ingenuity helicopter became the first aircraft in history to make a controlled motorized flight to another planet. The ingenuity team at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California confirmed that the flight was successful after obtaining data from the helicopter via NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover at 6:46 EDT (3:46 PDT). Ingenuity … Read more

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