On May 7, 2021, NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter successfully completed its fifth flight with one-way journey from the ‘Wright Brothers Field’ to a new airfield 129 m (423 feet) to the south.
NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter was captured after landing on May 7, 2021, by the Mastcam-Z imager aboard the Perseverance rover. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / ASU / MSSS.
Ingenuity’s fifth flight began at 3:26 p.m. EDT (12:26 p.m. PDT, 12:33 p.m. local Mars time) and lasted 108 seconds.
The Ingenuity team chose the new landing site based on information gathered during the previous flight — the first ‘aerial scout’ operation on another world — which enabled them to generate digital elevation maps indicating almost completely flat terrain with almost no obstructions.
“The fifth flight of Ingenuity is another great achievement for the agency,” said Dr. Bob Pearce, associate administrator for NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate.
“The continuing success of the helicopter proves the value of bringing together the strengths of diverse skill sets from across the agency to create the future, like flying an aircraft on another planet!”
“We bid adieu to our first Martian home, Wright Brothers Field, with grateful thanks for the support it provided to the historic first flights of a planetary rotorcraft,” said Ingenuity chief engineer Dr. Bob Balaram, a researcher at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
“No matter where we go from here, we will always carry with us a reminder of how much those two bicycle builders from Dayton meant to us during our pursuit of the first flight on another world.”
After arrival above the new airfield, Ingenuity climbed to an altitude record of 10 m (33 feet) and captured high-resolution color images of its new neighborhood before touching down.
The helicopter is now waiting for new instructions, relayed via Perseverance, from mission controllers.
The rover is also heading south, toward a region where it will commence science operations and sample collection.
“The plan forward is to fly Ingenuity in a manner that does not reduce the pace of Perseverance science operations,” Dr. Balaram said.
“We may get a couple more flights in over the next few weeks, and then the agency will evaluate how we’re doing.”
“We have already been able to gather all the flight performance data that we originally came here to collect.”
“Now, this new operations demo gives us an opportunity to further expand our knowledge of flying machines on other planets.”
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This article is based on text provided by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
