The Mars helicopter "Ingenuity" has successfully completed its seventh flight on Mars, which was the first after a serious change in the navigation system. The drone successfully flew to a new work site, covering a distance of 106 meters, according to NASA's Twitter account.
"Ingenuity" became the first extraterrestrial drone, which arrived on Mars in February this year, along with the rover"Perseverance". Initially, the task of the drone was to work out the technology of take-off, flight and landing in a rarefied atmosphere. After the helicopter successfully completed five experimental flights and showed that it is able to fly more than a hundred meters and stay in the air for almost 90 seconds, NASA decided not to complete its work, but to initiate a program of reconnaissance flights, which will last until August. However, the sixth flight of the "Ingenuity" was unsuccessful — the drone experienced a serious malfunction in the navigation system, but was able to safely land on the surface of Mars.
On June 6, 2021, the drone made its seventh flight, and the collected data was transmitted to Earth over the next three days. At first, the drone rose to a height of 10 meters, and then flew 106 meters to the south, where it landed in a new place, which was not previously observed by either the drone or the rover, but was approved according to the survey of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The entire flight lasted 62.8 seconds and was successful, no failures in the operation of the drone were recorded. The next flight will take place in the next two weeks.
You can learn about the difficulties of aerodynamic flight on the Red Planet from the material "Martian Screw" .
Alexander Voityuk
