Mars rover Perseverance spots Ingenuity helicopter resting on sand dune (photo) - Space.com

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NASA's Perseverance Mars rover captured this photograph of the Ingenuity chopper resting connected a soil dune connected the Red Planet. The Perservance squad posted this photograph connected Twitter connected Jan. 11, 2023. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

NASA's Perseverance rover conscionable caught different glimpse of its pioneering robotic cousin.

The car-sized Perseverance snapped a photograph precocious of the Ingenuity chopper arsenic the 4-pound (1.8 kilograms) rotorcraft sat atop a Red Planet soil dune.

"The #MarsHelicopter and I are person unneurotic than we've been successful a while, and conjecture who I spotted resting connected a dune betwixt flights. Can you judge Ingenuity is gearing up for Flight #39?" the Perseverance squad said via Twitter (opens successful caller tab) connected Wednesday (Jan. 11), successful a station that featured a photograph of the small chopper.

Zoomed-in presumption of a photograph of NASA's Ingenuity Mars chopper taken by the agency's Perseverance rover. The rover squad posted this representation connected Twitter connected Jan. 11, 2023.

Zoomed-in presumption of a photograph of NASA's Ingenuity Mars chopper taken by the agency's Perseverance rover. The rover squad posted this representation connected Twitter connected Jan. 11, 2023. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Ingenuity and Perseverance landed unneurotic wrong Mars' Jezero Crater successful February 2021. The 28-mile-wide (45 kilometers) Jezero hosted a large water and a stream delta agelong ago, and Perseverance is scouring the country for signs of past life connected Mars.

The six-wheeled robot is besides collecting and caching dozens of samples for aboriginal instrumentality to Earth. For the past fewer weeks, Perseverance has been caching immoderate of its illustration tubes successful a "depot" successful a spot of Jezero's level that the ngo squad calls Three Forks.

Perseverance has truthful acold deposited six of a planned 10 illustration tubes (opens successful caller tab) successful the Three Forks depot, which serves arsenic a backup successful lawsuit the rover isn't steadfast capable to haul worldly to a aboriginal NASA lander aboriginal this decade. A rocket aboard that lander volition motorboat the samples to Mars orbit, wherever they'll beryllium picked up by a European spacecraft and hauled backmost to Earth. The samples could onshore present as aboriginal arsenic 2033.

The depot samples are doubles; Perseverance is keeping a acceptable of worldly drilled from the aforesaid people rocks connected its body. If request be, 2 Ingenuity-like helicopters that volition motorboat with the aboriginal lander volition alert implicit to Three Forks and drawback the illustration tubes determination 1 by one.

Ingenuity is presently serving arsenic a scout for Perseverance, helping the rover squad prime the champion routes done the unsmooth Jezero scenery and place promising outcrops for in-depth study.

This enactment is portion of the chopper's extended mission. Not agelong aft landing, Ingenuity aced its superior five-flight campaign, showing that powered formation is imaginable successful the bladed Martian atmosphere.

Ingenuity conducted its 39th Martian formation connected Wednesday, covering 459 feet (140 meters) of crushed implicit the people of astir 79 seconds. To date, the chopper has flown a full of 25,690 feet (7,830 m) connected Mars and stayed airborne for much than 64 minutes, according to the mission's formation log (opens successful caller tab).

Perseverance has captured footage of Ingenuity before. The rover snapped photos of the chopper conscionable aft it deployed onto Jezero's floor, for example, and besides recorded video of Ingenuity's 13th flight, which took spot successful September 2021.

Mike Wall is the writer of "Out There (opens successful caller tab)" (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a publication astir the hunt for alien life. Follow him connected Twitter @michaeldwall (opens successful caller tab). Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens successful caller tab) and connected Facebook (opens successful caller tab).

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Michael Wall is simply a Senior Space Writer with Space.com (opens successful caller tab) and joined the squad successful 2010. He chiefly covers exoplanets, spaceflight and subject space, but has been known to dabble successful the abstraction creation beat. His publication astir the hunt for alien life, "Out There," was published connected Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a subject writer, Michael worked arsenic a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. successful evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor's grade from the University of Arizona, and a postgraduate certificate successful subject penning from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find retired what his latest task is, you tin travel Michael connected Twitter.

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