The first helicopter on Mars has already completed its 17th flight and for some time lost contact with the rover
NASA officials said that Ingenueiti successfully completed its seventeenth flight and thus continued to return to its first landing site. During the last flight, the device flew 187 meters, rose to a height of 10 meters and stayed in the air for 117 seconds.
Already at the final part of the flight during landing, the device for some time lost radio contact with the Perseverance rover due to difficult terrain conditions.
Representatives of the space agency also said that after a while they still began to receive data packets from the aircraft, but in fits and starts. At the same time, according to the data obtained, all the systems of the apparatus are normal.
In addition, engineers reported that in just 15 minutes, the battery charge of the Martian helicopter increased by 76 millivolts, which indicates that the device has successfully landed, and the solar panel is in the standard position.
NASA engineers will carefully study the situation for a better understanding of how it shows itself radio communication on Mars in order to understand why communication was cut off only during landing, and then again recovered.
It is curious that initially a different flight route was developed for Ingenyuiti, which excluded the loss of direct radio contact with the rover. But then the plans changed and the route was rebuilt.
This indicates the fact that NASA is working on a variety of situations, including creating conditions loss of direct radio contact and possible loss of communication with its subsequent restoration after a certain time.
Most likely, NASA engineers purposefully create a variety of conditions for flights in the conditions of Mars in order to make as much a complete picture for the implementation of future missions with already other aircraft, which, of course, will be directed in the future to Red planet.
In the meantime, we will be watching with interest the "adventures" and work of "Ingenueiti" on Mars.
Did you like the material? Then rate it and don't forget to subscribe to the channel. Thank you for your attention!