NASA Ingenuity Helicopter Successfully Stayed 77.4 Seconds on Air for Its 8th Flight

Ingenuity, NASA's Mars helicopter, has completed its eighth trip over the Martian surface as the crew works to figure out how it may help future space missions.

"Another successful flight for Ingenuity!" the team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), which is overseeing the current Mars mission, said in a tweet on Tuesday.

The Perseverance rover was on hand to keep an eye on NASA's Ingenuity helicopter as it attempted its first flights on Mars. The chopper is now repaying the favor by serving as a scout and companion for the frantic rover. It keeps racking up victories in the air.

Ingenuity Stayed On-Air For More Than 70 Seconds

On June 21, NASA announced that Ingenuity had finished its eighth flight. The rotorcraft flew about 525 feet (160 meters) south before landing at a new spot about 438 feet (133.5 meters) away from the rover. As it flew, it snapped a photo of its own shadow underneath it. Already, Ingenuity had a proven track record.

It completed its seventh flight earlier this month after demonstrating the first powered, controlled flight on another planet and surviving an in-flight anomaly. "The Mars helicopter is set to make its eighth flight, as it hops southward alongside me. Just a reminder that you're living in the future," the Perseverance team had tweeted on Friday.

Ingenuity, which made history in April by being the first aircraft to execute powered flight on another planet, lingered in the air for 77.4 seconds.

NASA's Plans For Mars Ingenuity Helicopter

After the Ingenuity survived Mars' extremely thin atmosphere during its historic inaugural flight, the JPL team began sending flight plans to send the 4-pound, 19-inch-high machine on increasingly ambitious missions across the Martian surface.

Ingenuity had a proven track record. The helicopter has gone the largest distance in a single trip, 266 meters, on its fourth flight. On its sixth mission, Ingenuity flew for the longest duration, 139.9 seconds. Ingenuity has reached speeds of 4 meters per second (approximately 9 miles per hour) and has flown up to 10 meters. It completed its seventh flight earlier this month after surviving an in-flight anomaly.

NASA believes that equipping a more advanced version of Ingenuity with high-resolution cameras will aid future rover expeditions to Mars and other worlds. Searching finding safe, clear pathways for a rover to take, allowing vehicles like Perseverance to move faster across the Martian surface as it goes between research locations, could be one of the tasks. A flying vehicle might also explore areas with too difficult terrain and dangerous for a ground vehicle to reach.

NASA's Mars helicopter has already surpassed expectations. The JPL team is keen to continue sending flight plans to Ingenuity to push the aircraft to its limits.

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