NASA's Martian Helicopter Has Been Very Busy

Around three years ago NASA launched the Ingenuity Helicopter which eventually touched down on Mars early the next year. Since 2021, NASA has been consistently flying the helicopter trying new and more ambitious routes each time. Just yesterday on the 5th, Ingenuity was scheduled for its 50th flight, expected to travel more than 1000 feet or around 306 meters in total.

The whole purpose of this helicopter was to determine if powered, controlled flight at the Red Planet was possible. If this were the case, it would open up a lot of future opportunities as NASA sets its sights on sending humans to the planet. In the over 2 years Ingenuity has been on the surface, not only has it shown that powered flight is possible, but it also has given the agency some new ideas.

What makes its tests so impressive is the fact that flight at Mars is extremely challenging because the Red Planet has significantly lower gravity and a very thin atmosphere. Here I will go more in-depth into the historic 50th flight, what exactly Ingenuity has been up to, why its results are so important, and more.

Credit:

Chapters:
0:00 - Intro
0:58 - Ingenuity's Progress
3:49 - NASA's Bold Mars Plan

[spearshaker]

Went from first flight on earth to flight on another planet in about a hundred years.

[dylangtech]

Mars is becoming the ideal sandbox for robotic probes before man can ever go there.

That fact that the sample return will require the participation of multiple robotic probes is a very fascinating challenge

[MichaelRobinson-wuob]

I’m sure he meant 1.5 minutes and not hours..

[nisenobody]

Imagine a super-scaled up martian helicopter transporting humans above the surface, like a pressurized vehicle... (let me dream)

[richardglady]

Wouldn’t be amazing if the world focused on advances like these, rather than politics. That all this is occurring, while being totally ignored by our media is so very sad. Thank you for this video.

[stevieathome]

Correction: longest flight is not "just under 1 1/2 hours", at 1:31. Perhaps just under 1 1/2 minutes, fyi.

[terryhayward]

I thought that the solar panels had stopped collecting enough power to fly again. Glad to see it is still running.

[johntuffy]

I think you may be mistaken about a 1.5 hour long flight

[chrismackerdush]

We are the aliens now, from a Martian’s perspective 😮Imagine waking up one day in your Martian foxhole to see that little helicopter flying around. Major freak out would result

[deeppurple]

Good update. I haven't been catching this for a while. Cheers ✌️☘️

[serronserron]

This Mission crew at the very least is justifying their paycheck with Around the Clock management of the vehicles. And this experience will be extremely useful for future missions as well. The coordination and new methods learned has not been attempted on the scale before.

[FranklinBryan]

It didn't fly an hour and a half? That's crazy

[quantumcat]

What amazed me is that the batteries in ingenuity are ordinary Sony li-ion. They experienced deep freezing while in hibernation. Yet they seem to work just fine.

[goldmagnet]

You said the longest flight was an hour and a half (1:30) ? Are you sure about that, seems ridiculous. I understood average flight times were between 60 and 90 seconds ?

[thefpvlife]

Great insight as I enjoy flying my fixed wing long range drone -Aero FPV

[robertbrander]

I complained about the $85 Million Dollar price tag on this Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, and it's 2 week life Expectancy ... But it is Proving to be a Success ! ... This could be a game changer in Exploring Moons and Planets ... It's too bad the Cameras and Bandwidth weren't better ... a $500 DJI Mini can 4K Video and sharp crisp Pictures, just like the Movies !

[nereanim]

Lower gravity = good, lower air density bad, so they aren't both bad for flight just the later.

[andrewhammond]

I think the Rover most can connect a brush on it to clean panel😅 5:26

[michaelreid]

Despite the problem posed by the overall width of the propeller I wonder if a toroidal propeller design would demonstrate the same efficiency increase as we have seen in Earth demonstration flights. I don't mean those goofy 3 lobe propeller designs (what were they thinking?!) But the real propellors?

[nickybritain]

I still can’t work out how a helicopter can fly in such a thin atmosphere. I realise gravity is only 38% that of Earths, but, the atmosphere is in single figures?