The Ingenuity helicopter has photographed the remains of the structure that carried the Perseverance rover to the Red Planet.
Recently you can we wrotethat a keen-eyed internet user spotted a strange, bright object in photos taken by Perseverance on 6 April, which many believed to be a parachute dropped by the vehicle and its companion, the Ingenuity helicopter, when it landed, and later confirmed by NASA expert Kevin M. Gill. The images just released by NASA show a closer look at the parachute and a closer look at the rear fairing protecting the structures.
The tiny helicopter took 10 photos of these objects during a 159-second flight on 19 April, the 26th flight of the device - from a Space. The footage shows the rear of the lander and the parachute left behind, in which the NASA team even included a coded message to the delight of space enthusiasts.
- Kevin M. Gill (@kevinmgill) April 27, 2022
Launched from Earth in July 2020, the Perseverance rover and its faithful companion, the Ingenuity helicopter, landed on the surface of Mars more than a year ago, in February 2021. The primary purpose of the tiny helicopter, weighing just 1.8 kilograms, is to see if robots of similar design can carry out their mission on the alien planet, while the Perseverance robot explores fascinating rocks, collects samples and searches for signs of former life on the red planet.