NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter just made its 65th and 66th Red Planet flights, two short hops that helped prep the chopper for a coming stretch in which it will be cut off from ground control.
Flight 65 occurred on Nov. 2. The 4-pound (1.8 kilograms) Ingenuity stayed aloft that day for 48 seconds, covering 23 feet (7 meters) of Mars ground in the process. Then, the rotorcraft was at it again on Nov. 3 with an even briefer sortie: It lasted 23 seconds and involved a horizontal movement of just 2 feet (0.6 m), according to the mission’s flight log.
Nothing went wrong on either flight; they weren’t designed to chew up big chunks of Martian terrain.
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