NASA performs investigation on grounded Ingenuity Helicopter on Mars

Los Angeles (The Uttam Hindu): Engineers at NASA have completed their investigation into the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, which has been permanently grounded on Mars since its last flight in January 2024. NASA engineers conducted the investigation.The investigation found that the helicopter's rotor blades were severely damaged after its final flight. Ingenuity's last flight took place on January 18, 2024, and the investigation followed shortly after. Ingenuity operated in Mars' Jezero Crater, where it arrived attached to NASA's Perseverance rover on February 18, 2021.The investigation concluded that the failure of Ingenuity's navigation system to provide accurate data during its final flight caused a chain of events leading to its damage. The navigation system's failure resulted in an inability to properly control the helicopter, which led to the damage to the rotor blades, ultimately ending the mission. Ingenuity, originally designed as a technology demonstration for five test flights over 30 days, ended up performing 72 flights over nearly three years, flying much farther than planned and accumulating over two hours of flight time. Despite being grounded after Flight 72, the helicopter continues to send weather and avionics data to the Perseverance rover once a week, which could be valuable for future Mars exploration. NASA stated that the lessons learned from this mission will help in the design of future Mars helicopters and aircraft for other planets. The 1.8-kilogram helicopter successfully demonstrated that powered flight is possible on Mars, where the atmosphere is very thin, and during its extended mission, it served as a scout for the Perseverance rover's life-searching and sample-collecting efforts.