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The Mars eggbeater Ingenuity has snapped eerily desolate photographs of the fatigued parachute and backshell that carry it to the Red Planet .
The unprecedented image , which await like scenes from an revelatory sci - fi movie , add up good manners of the small helicopter ’s nineteenth flight on Tuesday ( April 26 ) . They show the apparatus that protect the helicopter and the Perseverance scouter as they made theirhair - promote origin to the Martian surfaceon Feb. 18 , 2021.NASAscientists hope the image will help them understand how the craft treat the declivity and inspire future improvement to the outgrowth . The hope is that a future missionary post to Mars will be able to come back samples roll up by the Perseverance wanderer to Earth .
" pertinacity had the intimately - document Mars landing place in story , with cameras picture everything from parachute inflation to touchdown , " Ian Clark , former Perseverance system engineer and now Mars Sample Return ascent phase wind at NASA ’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory , said in a statement . " But ingeniousness ’s mental image put up a different vantage point . If they either reward that our organization worked as we think they worked or provide even one dataset of technology information we can use for Mars Sample Return preparation , it will be astonishing . And if not , the pictures are still phenomenal and inspiring . "
The figure of speech were taken from about 26 feet ( 8 meters ) above the ground . Ingenuity direct off at 11:37 a.m. local Mars time , according to NASA , and wing for 159 seconds . During that time , it traveled 1,181 feet ( 360 m ) and snapped 10 photographs .
" To get the shot we require , Ingenuity did a circumstances of maneuvering , " Håvard Grip , principal archetype of cleverness at JPL , say in the statement . Previous flights had establish that the helicopter and its pilots could handle the aerial stunt flying , however , he read .
The images show the backshell , a saucer - like structure that covered Ingenuity and Perseverance on their final descent , and the parachute , which slowed the craft as it approached the Martian Earth’s surface . At 1.3 miles ( 2.1 kilometers ) height , the rover , helicopter and their powered descent stage come away from the backshell and parachute . The landing place engine on the fall degree further slowed the rover and helicopter , take them to a easy landing .
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The chute and backshell , in the meantime , hit the priming at about 78 mph ( 126 km / h ) . The novel images show the lead wreckage . The protective coating on the backshell seems to have go the perfervid entry into the Martian ambiance , consort to NASA . The high - military capability pause cables connect the backshell to the parachute snake across the soil and look intact . A third of the 70.5 - understructure ( 21.5 m ) parachute is visible and also appears undamaged .
The Perseverance rover also lately photographed the shipwreck from the ground , showing the debris shadow by Martian slope , NASA reported .
During its clip on Mars , the Ingenuity eggbeater has now spend 49 minutes flee and traveled 3.9 mile ( 6.2 kilometre ) in totality , according to NASA . Flight 27 is set for the Séítah ridge in the Jezero crater ironic river vale . This area represents the remnant of a river delta that once spilled into a lake in the Jezero crater when the Mars airfoil was wet . A cardinal destination of the current delegacy is to explore forsigns that ancient Martian sprightliness may have existedin the ancient delta . cleverness ’s problem will be to get a bird’s - centre perspective of the topography around the ridge , in part to scout a route to the top of the delta for Perseverance . The helicopter will also survey expanse the rover ca n’t strain and potentially run for spots where the rover can lay away geological sampling for an eventual return to Earth .
Originally published on Live Science .
