NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, which revolutionized powered flight on Mars, is transitioning to a new role after a crash ended its flight capabilities. Despite suffering rotor damage during its 72nd flight on January 18, 2024, Ingenuity will now serve as a weather station, collecting telemetry and images daily for up to 20 years, according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
Ingenuity was designed to fly just five demonstration flights but vastly exceeded expectations, completing 72 missions over nearly three years. Its success paved the way for future Martian aerial exploration.
The project manager of Ingenuity, Teddy Tzanetos, told participants at the 2024 Annual Meeting of the American Geophysical Union that, even though the helicopter has stopped flying, its systems – avionics, battery, and sensors – are all still working. “She still has one final gift for us,” Tzanetos said, as Ingenuity continued to take measurements and images each day.
This investigation into the crash by JPL showed that the helicopter’s navigation system struggled with featureless Martian terrain, making precise landings a challenge. However, this doesn’t mean that Ingenuity wasn’t durable; its other systems were still working fine.
But a big hurdle remains: Ingenuity relies on the Perseverance rover for communication with Earth, and that rover is now 1.8 miles away. That increasing distance may translate to the helicopter losing contact within the next month. Without the rover relaying its data, the priceless information from Ingenuity could stay on Mars until it is retrieved by missions in the future.
Ingenuity’s legacy will live on in NASA’s plans for advanced Martian helicopters. JPL revealed a concept for the “Mars Chopper,” a six-rotor craft designed to carry science equipment and explore remote areas of the Red Planet. While still conceptual, the Mars Chopper would be 20 times heavier than Ingenuity and capable of traveling up to 2 miles per day.
In so doing, Ingenuity proved not only that powered flight could work on Mars but also that a small mission like this could inspire ambitious plans for aerial exploration.
