Following the crash of NASA’s helicopter “Ingenuity” on Mars almost a year ago, engineers have pinpointed the cause of its final flight failure.
Ingenuity was a technology demonstration experiment by NASA to test if a four-pound
helicopter could fly in Mars’s thin atmosphere, which is just 1% of Earth’s density. It made history as the first powered, controlled aircraft on another planet.
Originally planned for five test flights over 30 Martian days, Ingenuity surpassed all expectations during its nearly three-year mission. It landed on Mars in February 2021 attached to NASA’s Perseverance rover and took its maiden flight two months later. According to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the aircraft exceeded its planned flight distance by more than 30 times and accumulated over two hours of flight time. After four test flights, Ingenuity aided Perseverance scientists as an aerial scout on Mars.
During its 72nd and
final flight on Jan. 18, Ingenuity climbed to 40 feet above the Martian surface, hovered for 4.5 seconds, then descended at 3.3 feet per second. After 32 seconds, communication with the rover was lost as the helicopter landed on the surface.
An investigation by engineers from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and AeroVironment concluded that Ingenuity crashed due to a navigation system issue.
Ingenuity’s navigation system used a downward-facing camera to track visual features on the surface, but during Flight 72 in a region of steep, featureless sand ripples, the system failed to find enough surface features, leading to navigation failure and a hard landing.
The crash caused four rotor blades to break, leading to power loss and communication failure. Despite the crash, Ingenuity continues to provide data to the Perseverance rover on a weekly basis.
Engineers are now working on a more advanced version of Ingenuity called the Mars Chopper, which will be larger and capable of carrying more equipment for exploring remote Martian locations.
