The Historic Moment Of NASA's Ingenuity Helicopter Airing Success On Planet Mars

NASA Ingenuity helicopter premiers to Mars (NASA doc.)

JAKARTA - NASA has successfully flown an Ingenuity helicopter on Mars. This success is a new breakthrough in the exploration of the red planet.

The success of flying the Ingenuity helicopter was immortalized by the Perseverance rover robot. The rover robot, which carried the Ingenuity helicopter from Earth to Mars, recorded the historical flight seconds at 3:34 p.m. US time.

This first flight did not last long. However, NASA calls it the “Wright Brothers moment,” a reference to Wilbur and Orville Wright's success in flying planes to Earth in 1903.

"We have talked for so long about our Wright brothers moment on Mars, and here it is," said engineer MiMi Aung, as quoted from the NASA website, Tuesday, April 20.

"I don't think I can ever stop watching it ..." #MarsHelicopter project manager MiMi Aung talks about how Ingenuity flew just the way they had expected it to fly. See the hi-res video. pic.twitter.com/cBoCzSlpZB

- NASA (@NASA) April 19, 2021

Initially, NASA scheduled the Ingenuity helicopter flight on April 11. However, NASA put it off due to problematic software.

The NASA Ingenuity helicopter was carried by the Perseverance rover robot, which has landed on the surface of the planet Mars since 18 February. This explorer robot has a mission to find signs of life on the Red Planet.

Flying a helicopter on the Red Planet is no easy matter. The atmosphere on Mars is very thin, with a density of only 1 percent of the air compared to Earth's atmosphere.

This leaves the helicopter blades with little lift. Lower gravity than Earth makes Ingenuity helicopters need a lot of power to lift itself into the air.

Therefore, NASA designed the Ingenuity to be light in weight. It weighs only 1.8 kg, with a width of 1.2 meters and a length of 48.2 cm.

"History shows that they are back at work to learn as much as possible about their new aircraft, and we will too," he added.

It happened. Today our #MarsHelicopter proved that powered, controlled flight from the surface of another planet is possible. It takes a little ingenuity, perseverance, and spirit to make that opportunity a reality: https://t.co/oT3rrBm6wj pic.twitter.com/u63GKshp0G

- NASA (@NASA) April 19, 2021

Not only that, the long distance between Mars and Earth makes it impossible for NASA to control Ingenuity manually with a joystick. So they control the helicopter with onboard guidance, navigation, and a control system that executes the algorithm.

"We'll take a moment to celebrate our success and then take a cue from Orville and Wilbur about what to do next," he said.

The research team will receive the data sent by Ingenuity and carry out an analysis of the data in the coming days. They will also schedule a second phase of Ingenuity helicopter flights for April 22.

"We'll take a moment to celebrate our success and then take a cue from Orville and Wilbur about what to do next," he concluded.