Commencement Day

In this concept illustration provided by NASA, NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter stands on the Red Planet's surface. NASA/Getty Images

Ginny's graduated. No longer a test but rather a partner to Percy as the little chopper has passed every test as a viable scout to a rover. Tech at it's best defines just how well NASA designed this system for an economical 85 million. Awesome says it all.

"Ingenuity's transition from conducting a technology demonstration to an operations demonstration brings with it a new flight envelope," NASA said.

"There will be more precision maneuvering, greater use of its aerial-observation capabilities, and more risk overall," it added.

The additional testing will be conducted over the next few months, ending no later than August.

While the first helicopter flight went just 10 feet above the ground, each voyage has drastically increased in distance. On the fourth flight, the helicopter rose 16 feet in the air and made a round trip of 872 feet across the planet.

Details ...

NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter (above center to the right) is viewed by one of the hazard cameras aboard the Perseverance rover during the helicopter’s fourth flight on April 30, 2021. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech.

Ingenuity successfully completed its fourth flight today, and we couldn’t be happier. The helicopter took off at 10:49 a.m. EDT (7:49 a.m. PDT, or 12:33 local Mars time), climbing to an altitude of 16 feet (5 meters) before flying south approximately 436 feet (133 meters) and then back, for an 872-foot (266-meter) round trip. In total, we were in the air for 117 seconds. That’s another set of records for the helicopter, even compared to the spectacular third flight.

We also managed to capture lots of images during the flight with the color camera and with Ingenuity’s black-and-white navigation camera, which tracks surface features as it flies. Images from that navigation camera are typically used by Ingenuity’s flight controller and then thrown away unless we specifically tell the helicopter to store them for later use. During this flight, we saved even more images than we did on our previous flights: about 60 total during the last 164 feet (50 meters) before the helicopter returned to its landing site.

Commencement Day, the day marking the start of a new chapter certainly applies to Ginny, right? :)