Perseverance marked the spot where NASA's flagship helicopter – NASA – ended up

The legendary duo of explorers sent by NASA to the Red Planet are now heading their separate ways, as Perseverance tracks down the whereabouts of its flying friend, who was severely damaged during the journey, making it impossible to fly again.

As shown by the optical material received by the US Space Agency from the surface of Mars,… cleverness The ship rests on a sand dune in the Neretva Valais area as the Perseverance ship begins to move away from the site. The footage was recorded last Sunday and edited by Simon Schmausa graphic design student, turned it into a panoramic image by compiling six images that NASA posted online.

Ingenuity suffered damage that permanently pinned it to the surface of Mars during its final flyby on January 18, when it broke all four of its rotors during its 72nd landing attempt. NASA is still investigating why the small plane lost contact with the control center and crashed.

The 48 cm long, 1.8 kg helicopter is the first self-propelled aircraft to take off from the surface of another planet. It arrived at Mars in February 2021, along with the Perseverance rover, and was originally planned for just five test flights over 30 days. In the three years that followed, Ingenuity continued to impress, flying 14 times farther than its designers had hoped, and clocking a total of two hours of flight time. In fact, the small plane became a valuable assistant to the Perseverance rover, flying above the wheeled rover, helping it chart a course on Mars.

Perseverance and Ingenuity were sent to the Red Planet to explore Jezero Crater, with the aim of locating organic molecules, in an area where scientists expect millions of years ago there once was an expansive lake. Now, Perseverance is asked to live up to its name (Perseverance) and continue on its own, leaving the small helicopter behind, to settle forever on the sand dunes of Mars.