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A Mars Rover and a Mars Flyer (Artist's Concept)

Jul 14, 2020
When NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter attempts its first test flight on the Red Planet, the agency's Mars 2020 Perseverance rover will be close by, as seen in this artist's concept.

When NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter attempts its first test flight on the Red Planet, the agency's Mars 2020 Perseverance rover will be close by, as seen in this artist's concept.

Ingenuity, a technology experiment, will be the first aircraft to attempt controlled flight on another planet. When it attempts its test flights on Mars in spring 2021, Ingenuity will remain within a 0.6-mile (1-kilometer) radius of Perseverance so it can communicate wirelessly with the rover. Perseverance then communicates with relay orbiters around Mars that send the signal back to Earth.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory built and will manage operations of Perseverance and Ingenuity for the agency. Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages JPL for NASA.

For more information about the Mars 2020 Perseverance mission, go to https://mars.nasa.gov/perseverance.

For more information about Ingenuity, go to https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter.