The Ingenuity Helicopter Launch
The Mars helicopter should be launching soon. Maybe even as early as April 8, 2021. If all goes to plan in about two weeks. The rover will begin A six day process of Deploying Ingenuity helicopter on the Mars soil.
The Mars Helicopter integration lead for Perseverance, Farah Alibay said “All activities are closely coordinated, irreversible, and dependent on each other. If there is even a hint that something isn’t going as expected, we may decide to hold off for a sol or more until we have a better idea what is going on.”
The perseverance Rover will get to work once it reaches the center of Ingenuity's airfield. The Ingenuity airfield is a square about 33 feet wide that is relatively flat and non-hazardous to the Mars Helicopter. The airfield is located near the Jezero Crater.
The importance of Ingenuity helicopter
The Mars helicopter could possibly make Rovers more effective. As you know Rovers are very expensive and take years to make. Once the Rover reach the Martian planet. It takes engineers 10 minutes to communicate with the Rover on Mars. Resulting in extremely slow progression. For example, the opportunity rover was launched on January 24, 2004 and died 15 years later from the Red planets harsh conditions. Over the 15 year time period the Rover traveled 28 miles.
