SAN FRANCISCO, iNews.id – NASA made the 17th flight for Ingenuity Mars The helicopter on Sunday, December 5, 2021. Everything went according to plan as long as the helicopter crossed 614 feet to the Northeast.
However, during the final descent phase of the flight, the communication link between Ingenuity and the Perseverance rover was disrupted. The helicopter appears to have landed successfully. About 15 minutes after the radio link was lost, Perseverance received an Ingenuity telemetry packet indicating that the battery and flight electronics were healthy.
NASA believes the loss of the radio link was due to the challenging radio configuration between Perseverance and Ingenuity during the helicopter landing. NASA telemetry data from the flight showed the vehicle performed as expected during its 117-second flight at 33 feet above the Martian surface.
However, the telemetry data was lost for about a third of the last drop from about 10 feet above the Martian surface. NASA says before it can pinpoint exactly what happened to cause the loss of the radio link, it will have to transfer the missing data from Flight 17 from the helicopter to Perseverance and then to Earth.
NASA was able to relay that data to Earth on Wednesday of this week, and the data shows the power aboard the helicopter is excellent. The level of power transferred from the solar panels to the six lithium-ion batteries inside the helicopter is strong enough that NASA believes the helicopter is in an upright position.
However, the Ingenuity team continued to experience communication line issues, which they believe caused the loss of telemetry data during the flight. Line-of-site issues have prevented most data packets from being relayed to the rover.
The awesome data package also includes all the imagery from the flight. NASA said that they expect the opportunity to transfer data in the next few days, as quoted from Slash Gears.
NASA knew Ingenuity would face challenges with the rugged environment in which it currently operates. The helicopter has operated well past its original mission timeline, and was originally designed to operate on flat ground.
Editor: Dini Listiyani
