Ingenuity’s status uncertain but likely healthy
Click for interactive map.
Updates from the engineering team that operates the Mars helicopter Ingenuity in the past two days have suggested the helicopter might be in trouble. First the team issued a status update yesterday that indicated communications had been lost prematurely during the helicopter’s 72nd flight.
The flight was designed as a quick pop-up vertical flight to check out the helicopter’s systems, following an unplanned early landing during its previous flight. Data Ingenuity sent to the Perseverance rover (which acts as a relay between the helicopter and Earth) during the flight indicates it successfully climbed to its assigned maximum altitude of 40 feet (12 meters). During its planned descent, communications between the helicopter and rover terminated early, prior to touchdown.
A further update today said that communications had been regained, but also noted that the engineering team still did not have a full understanding of the helicopter’s status.
We’ve reestablished contact with the #MarsHelicopter after instructing @NASAPersevere
to perform long-duration listening sessions for Ingenuity’s signal.
Based on the information released (or lack thereof) from the previous flight, the 71st, it is my sense that the situation is not as dire as these reports suggest, and that the situation might simply be related to issues of communications. Let me explain why I have come to this conclusion.
Look at the overview map above. The blue dot marks Perseverance’s present position, as of today. Though Ingenuity has flown twice since completing its 70th flight on December 22, 2023, its location on this map had not been updated.
It completed its 71st flight on January 6, 2024, but that flight ended prematurely, apparently putting the helicopter down at an unexpected spot. Based on the flight plan, Ingenuity was supposed to travel 1,175 feet for about 124 seconds. Instead, the flight log indicates it only flew 233 feet for 35 seconds.
In order to have good communications with Ingenuity engineers must have a clear line-of-sight to Perseverance. Each flight is planned with this crucial fact in mind. If the helicopter lands at a spot where communciations are impossible, than nothing can happen until Perseverance moves into a position where line-of-sight is regained. This loss of communications has happened before, for two months in May and June of 2023 after Ingenuity’s 52nd flight The helicopter engineering team simply prepared a plan for when communications were restored, and then implemented it. Ingenuity has since completed 20 more flights.
I have assumed for the past three weeks that the lack of an update to the map above — as well as the lack of any images from the 71st flight — was because full communications had not been possible from the location where Ingenuity landed. The team was able to communicate with the helicopter, but was unable to download images or a full set of data.
Thus, they didn’t know where it was, precisely. Based on the flight plan for the 72nd flight, I suspected its intention was to get a better idea of that location. The plan called for the helicopter to go straight up and down about 39 feet for 32 seconds. As the plan notes, the goal was “localization.” By going up it would regain, if temporarily, line-of-sight with Perseverance, and enable transfer of additional and needed data.
On January 18, 2024 Ingenuity executed this flight, rising forty feet and sending data as to its position and height during the flight. As it descended however I suspect it dropped into a slightly different spot, into a place that had an even poorer line-of-sight with Perseverance. Thus, the complete loss of communications.
The new update today, stating that some communications has been regained, suggests strongly that the helicopter remains healthy, but its position is such that full communications are difficult if not impossible. However, the data obtained during this short hop will likely give the engineers an improved idea of where it is, which will give the Perseverance engineering team guidance on where to go to regain full line-of-sight communications.
There are no guarantees, but I suspect that when the Perseverance team is finally ready to move out into Neretva Vallis (the red dotted line indicates the planned route), once it does so it will re-establish communications and Ingenuity will fly on.
That is at least my optimistic appraisal. We shall get a better idea in the next few weeks.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Click for interactive map.
Updates from the engineering team that operates the Mars helicopter Ingenuity in the past two days have suggested the helicopter might be in trouble. First the team issued a status update yesterday that indicated communications had been lost prematurely during the helicopter’s 72nd flight.
The flight was designed as a quick pop-up vertical flight to check out the helicopter’s systems, following an unplanned early landing during its previous flight. Data Ingenuity sent to the Perseverance rover (which acts as a relay between the helicopter and Earth) during the flight indicates it successfully climbed to its assigned maximum altitude of 40 feet (12 meters). During its planned descent, communications between the helicopter and rover terminated early, prior to touchdown.
A further update today said that communications had been regained, but also noted that the engineering team still did not have a full understanding of the helicopter’s status.
We’ve reestablished contact with the #MarsHelicopter after instructing @NASAPersevere
to perform long-duration listening sessions for Ingenuity’s signal.
Based on the information released (or lack thereof) from the previous flight, the 71st, it is my sense that the situation is not as dire as these reports suggest, and that the situation might simply be related to issues of communications. Let me explain why I have come to this conclusion.
Look at the overview map above. The blue dot marks Perseverance’s present position, as of today. Though Ingenuity has flown twice since completing its 70th flight on December 22, 2023, its location on this map had not been updated.
It completed its 71st flight on January 6, 2024, but that flight ended prematurely, apparently putting the helicopter down at an unexpected spot. Based on the flight plan, Ingenuity was supposed to travel 1,175 feet for about 124 seconds. Instead, the flight log indicates it only flew 233 feet for 35 seconds.
In order to have good communications with Ingenuity engineers must have a clear line-of-sight to Perseverance. Each flight is planned with this crucial fact in mind. If the helicopter lands at a spot where communciations are impossible, than nothing can happen until Perseverance moves into a position where line-of-sight is regained. This loss of communications has happened before, for two months in May and June of 2023 after Ingenuity’s 52nd flight The helicopter engineering team simply prepared a plan for when communications were restored, and then implemented it. Ingenuity has since completed 20 more flights.
I have assumed for the past three weeks that the lack of an update to the map above — as well as the lack of any images from the 71st flight — was because full communications had not been possible from the location where Ingenuity landed. The team was able to communicate with the helicopter, but was unable to download images or a full set of data.
Thus, they didn’t know where it was, precisely. Based on the flight plan for the 72nd flight, I suspected its intention was to get a better idea of that location. The plan called for the helicopter to go straight up and down about 39 feet for 32 seconds. As the plan notes, the goal was “localization.” By going up it would regain, if temporarily, line-of-sight with Perseverance, and enable transfer of additional and needed data.
On January 18, 2024 Ingenuity executed this flight, rising forty feet and sending data as to its position and height during the flight. As it descended however I suspect it dropped into a slightly different spot, into a place that had an even poorer line-of-sight with Perseverance. Thus, the complete loss of communications.
The new update today, stating that some communications has been regained, suggests strongly that the helicopter remains healthy, but its position is such that full communications are difficult if not impossible. However, the data obtained during this short hop will likely give the engineers an improved idea of where it is, which will give the Perseverance engineering team guidance on where to go to regain full line-of-sight communications.
There are no guarantees, but I suspect that when the Perseverance team is finally ready to move out into Neretva Vallis (the red dotted line indicates the planned route), once it does so it will re-establish communications and Ingenuity will fly on.
That is at least my optimistic appraisal. We shall get a better idea in the next few weeks.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Nice analysis, Bob.