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Forum: Satellites - Robotic Probes
Topic: [Discuss] NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter

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Message to Edit: HTML is ON UBB Code is ON Smilies Legend	Originally posted by Robert Pearlman on 04-20-2021 09:02 AM [QUOTE]Originally posted by oly: [b]Flying a drone on Mars is more of an add-on to the technology that exists here on Earth that school kids play with every day.[/b][/QUOTE] Your comment reminded me of something that Bob Balaram, Ingenuity's chief engineer, said during yesterday's press conference: <BLOCKQUOTE>[i]Purely as to terminology, whether you call it a rotorcraft or a helicopter or a drone, you could use those interchangeably. I think one of the connotations of 'drone' here is that it has a little bit of the off-the-shelf, you go buy it at your favorite store and you can fly it out of the box. Ingenuity is quite different. It had to be designed from the ground up for a very alien, very harsh environment. We don't have drones that survive -130 degrees Fahrenheit at night, we don't have drones that fly in one percent of the atmosphere of Earth. So, if you're careful about using the word 'drone' and your remember that this is a very, very, very, special drone, you can say drone. But I just want to make sure that people don't lose track of the fact that it is a very special aircraft that is quite unique.[/i]</BLOCKQUOTE>
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