The Mars Ingenuity Helicopter Communicates For The Last Time

Ingenuity display before landing hard (photo: dock. NASA)

JAKARTA Helicopter Ingenuity on Mars has carried out its final mission on January 25. However, the rotor plane is still communicating with its base station, namely the Perseverance rover. Unfortunately, communication between the two devices on the Red Planet has ended. NASA said the Ingenuity team had gathered in the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) control room on Tuesday, April 16 to see the transmission of the latest data from Ingenuity. Ingenuity Team Leader Josh Anderson said that Mars helicopters would be difficult in the face of the night. Although this news is quite sad, Anderson is proud that Ingenuity has been able to operate for nearly three years. Ingenuity will not enter that beautiful Mars night easily," Anderson said. "Almost cannot be trusted that after more than 1,000 days on the surface of Mars, 72 flights, it still has something to give." Initially, Ingenuity was designed for an experimental mission for 30 days. However, surprisingly, the rotor plane was able to operate more than the specified time and its flight distance was 14 times further than expected. Unfortunately, Ingenuity experienced a hard landing on its 72nd flight and damaged its rotor blades. The unexpected landing made Ingenuity unable to move and remain in the Valinor Hills area to date.

Ingenuity is able to survive to date due to software updates sent by its development team. The software makes Ingenuity continue to collect data every day even though it can't move. "Insinyur Ingenuity and Mars scientists believe that such long-term data collection is not only beneficial for future aircraft designers and other vehicles for the Red Planet, but also provides a long-term perspective on Mars' weather pattern and dust movement," NASA said. Ingenuity will continue to collect data on Mars, even until 20 years from time. However, this data cannot be transmitted to Perseverance because communications have been cut off. The only way to retrieve data is to visit Ingenuity in Valinor Hills.