March: the Ingenuity drone-helicopter will return for a few months of additional missions

The drone-helicopter Ingenuity went well beyond the expectations of the NASA, and inevitably, the engineers on the ground can’t get enough of it: the American space agency confirmed a few days ago that the little drone was going to be back for a few months of additional missions! After all, Ingenuity has already completed 22 flights over the Red Planet ! During the last flight dated March 20, 2022, Ingenuity flew for 101.4 seconds and at an almost constant altitude of 10 meters.

Ingenuity’s next missions should carry the drone-helicopter to the delta of the Jezero River, a particularly rocky and rugged area of ​​Mars… and therefore conducive to small incidents along the way. If everything goes smoothly, Ingenuity will definitely land on Mars in September 2022. Not bad for a device that was originally supposed to complete its exploration missions just thirty days after arriving on the red planet… As a reminder , Ingenuity performed its first “Martian” flight on April 19, 2021.