Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
      fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
                    written by a professional astronomer.

                                2021 April 20

                      Ingenuity: First Flight over Mars
                 Video Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, ASU, MSSS

   Explanation: What's the best way to explore Mars? Perhaps there is no
   single best way, but a newly demonstrated method shows tremendous
   promise: flight. Powered flight has the promise to search vast regions
   and scout out particularly interesting areas for more detailed
   investigation. Yesterday, for the first time, powered flight was
   demonstrated on Mars by a small helicopter named Ingenuity. In the
   featured video, Ingenuity is first imaged by the Perseverance rover
   sitting quietly on the Martian surface. After a few seconds,
   Ingenuity's long rotors begin to spin, and a few seconds after that --
   history is made as Ingenuity actually takes off, hovers for a few
   seconds, and then lands safely. More tests of Ingenuity's unprecedented
   ability are planned over the next few months. Flight may help humanity
   better explore not only Mars, but Saturn's moon Titan over the next few
   decades.

                 Tomorrow's picture: big magnetic collision
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       Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
            NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply.
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                      A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC
                             & Michigan Tech. U.

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