NASA’s Mars helicopter Ingenuity is warming up its rotor blades as the team’s engineers make the final preparations for its very first flight on the Red Planet, scheduled for Sunday (April 11).
The agency is holding a final pre-flight news conference today (April 9) at 13:00 EDT (1700 GMT), which you can view on this page or directly on NASA TV. The event promises to provide more details on how the helicopter will function during its first flight attempt.
In one of the last tests before attempting to take off, the helicopter warmed up its rotor blades and moved at a speed of 50 revolutions per minute. “Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle,” NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) written in a tweet posted on April 9th. “With just a little swing, the #MarsHelicopter shifted its blades and turned up to 50 rpm in preparation for the first flight!”
Helicopter on Mars! NASA teaches kids about Ingenuity’s upcoming first flight
It’s much slower than the blades will rotate during the actual flight, and NASA will do another test on the ground to mimic the rotors’ 2,400 rpm airspeed before the helicopter flies.
Meanwhile, the car has size Perseverance which led Ingenuity to the Red Planet is about halfway through the ride from Ingenuity’s airport to the view about 60 meters (60 meters) away, where the Rover will be stationed to see the flight attempt through its cameras. according to a separate tweet from the mission’s account.
Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA’s co-administrator of science, will appear at today’s event; Elsa Jensen, uplink industry leader at Malin Space Science Systems for the Mastcam-Z camera for perseverance that will watch the flight; and three Ingenuity team members at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California: project manager MiMi Aung, industry leader Tim Canham, and test engineer Amelia Quon.
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