Nasa’s Mars helicopter Ingenuity will never fly again, the space agency gas said.
The pioneering robot vehicle was the first ever to achieve powered and controlled flight on another world.
It had only been intended for a 30-day mission, intended as a demonstration of the technology, which it conducted by travelling to Mars along with the Perseverance rover. But that month became almost three years and dozens of flights, before Nasa said that it would never take off again.
Nasa lost contact with Ingenuity recently but managed to get in touch with it once again. However, it sent back imagery that showed it had become damaged.
Those pictures, sent on 18 January after its 72nd flight, showed that it would be its final mission. The pictures show that a part of one of its rotor blades had broken and that it would no longer be able to fly again.
“It is bittersweet that I must announce that Ingenuity, the ‘little helicopter that could’ – and it kept saying, ‘I think I can, I think I can’ – well, it has now taken its last flight on Mars,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in a video posted on social media.
What was planned as a 30-day technology demonstration of no more than five short flights ended up stretching well beyond the expectations of engineers who designed and built the helicopter at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) near Los Angeles.
Ingenuity ultimately buzzed over the Martian terrain 14 times farther than originally planned, logging more than two hours, eight minutes of flight time and covering a distance of 10.5 miles (17 km) through all 72 flights. Its peak altitude was measured at 78.7 feet (24 meters).
The rotor-craft was carried to the Red Planet strapped to the belly of NASA’s Perseverance rover, which landed three years ago on the floor of a vast Martian basin called Jerezo Crater on a separate mission aimed primarily at collecting surface samples for eventual return to Earth.
When the 4-pound (1.8-kg) rotor craft performed its modest, debut takeoff and landing in the thin Martian atmosphere on April 19, 2021 – a flight of 39 seconds – it was hailed as an seminal feat of interplanetary aviation.
NASA likened Ingenuity‘s achievement at Jezero Crater to the historic first controlled flight of the Wright brothers’ motor-driven airplane near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, in December 1903.
Over time, JPL continued to send the helicopter on progressively more ambitious flights, pushing its capabilities.
The end came after JPL teams began flying Ingenuity into a particularly barren, featureless area of Mars, testing the limits of an auto-navigational system that depends on visible landmarks for aviation guidance, according to Teddy Tzanetos, JPL’s Ingenuity project manager.
The US space agency said Ingenuity made an “emergency landing” during what became its penultimate flight on 6 January, apparently setting itself down more abruptly than planned due to navigational disorientation.
When JPL controllers sought to perform a short, vertical flight 12 days later to determine Ingenuity‘s location, data shows it rose off the ground, hovered briefly, then began a descent before losing contact with the rover, which serves as its communications relay with Earth.
Images the helicopter sent days later captured the shadow of its damaged rotor blade, apparently broken during its final touchdown, Tzanetos told reporters.
Engineers believe guidance difficulties posed by the “bland” terrain where Ingenuity was flying resulted in a loss of equilibrium that caused the vehicle to suddenly tilt or move sideways, which in turn led to the rotors striking the surface, Tzanetos said.
Ingenuity, resembling a box with four legs and parasol of rotor blades and solar panel, will live out its final days idle but emitting periodic blips of data before losing contact with the rover as Perseverance moves farther away.
Still, Nasa officials celebrated Ingenuity‘s exploits as paving the way for a new mode of aerial exploration on Mars and elsewhere in the solar system, such as Saturn’s moon Titan, for which a rotor-craft called Dragonfly is under development.
Building a helicopter to fly on Mars posed major engineering hurdles.
While Mars possesses much less gravity to overcome than Earth, its atmosphere is only 1% as dense, making it especially hard to gain aerodynamic lift. Thus, Ingenuity was fitted with rotor blades that are larger and spin far more rapidly than would be needed on Earth for a similar craft of its size.
The small, lightweight vehicle also had to withstand punishing cold, with nighttime temperatures dipping as low as 130 degrees below zero Fahrenheit (minus 90 Celsius).
Engineers will run final tests on Ingenuity and download remaining images from its onboard computer, Nasa said.
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.
Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.
She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.
Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.
“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.
It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.
Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.
Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.
Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.
“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.
He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.
Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.
Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.
Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.
The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.
The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.
It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.
Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.
Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.
Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.
Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.
Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.
The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”
VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.
Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”
Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.
“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.
B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.
Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.
Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.
Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.
“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”
Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”
“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.
Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.
“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.
