The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) successfully landed the Perseverance rover and Ingenuity helicopter for exploration on Mars in February of last year. The minimal-sized helicopter sent as part of the Mars Exploration Program has made 19 long-term reconnaissance flights to date. However, Ingenuity has had some issues recently.
blocked navigation camera in sandstorm on Mars
Ingenuity helicopter made its 19th flight in the past weeks. However, it was announced that he had to deal with some problems before the flight. According to the statement made by NASA, the large sandstorm that formed on Mars prevented the reconnaissance flight. When the storm was over, it left some problems behind.
Sandstorm on Mars rendered the Ingenuity rover’s navigation camera inoperable. So much so that after the storm, the dust accumulation in front of the camera made it impossible to determine the direction of the vehicle. Thereupon, the relevant team at NASA made a series of studies to fix the problem. Jaakko Karras, Chief Creativity Engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, gave the following sentences on the subject.
Flight 19 was delayed due to an unexpected sandstorm. Ingenuity continued to wake up during the storm and communicate with Perseverance. However, the storm left debris in the navigation camera window, especially around the camera’s field of view. Fortunately, Ingenuity’s software has helped us deal with this problem.
The 19th flight, the first flight of 2022, took place with the help of “an updated image mask file that tells the visual navigation software to ignore certain regions of the image,” as NASA stated. This flight brought the record with it. Ingenuity broke its own record by making the longest flight over Mars.
NASA shared this information during his speech stating that he was preparing for the 20th flight. NASA’s responsible team continues preparations for “Flight 20,” where Ingenuity will continue its march with Perseverance to the rover’s landing site, the Octavia E. Butler Landing Site. Both vehicles will move together and start traveling to the Jezero Crater river delta.
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