Mars Helicopter Ingenuity takes vertical position under Perseverance Rover

Good Monday Morning my Brothers and Sisters!

Mission Control has taken one more step to placing the INgenuity Helicopter on its Helipad by partially releasing it into a more vertical position beneath the rover... I have more to show you this morning, but this is the first of them... Best watched in Full Screen...

Here are some NASA comments:

On March 28, 2021 NASA’s Mars Helicopter Ingenuity took vertical position (upright) under Perseverance Rover at Helipad. Helicopter release system unlocked yesterday. Today ingenuity made one more step to be deployed from Perseverance. As for now, NASA’s rover prepares to unlock Helicopter’s landing legs and put it on the Mars’s surface. Flight scheme is known.

Solar panel charges Lithium-ion batteries, providing enough energy for one 90-second flight per Martian day (~350 Watts of average power during flight). Atmospheric weather relates to conditions such as air density at flight time, which affects the thrust that can be produced by the rotor and could result in adjustments of flight parameters. Temperature and wind profiles during the day are used to estimate the energy required to operate heaters. Winds at the time of the flight are tied to risks associated with takeoff, landing, and flying in high winds or very gusty conditions. All the things that a pilot on Earth would care about too!

Credit: nasa.gov, NASA/JPL-Caltech, NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU

Enjoy!
Kerry
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