Ingenuity Mars helicopter notches 33rd Red Planet flight

This past weekend, NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter flew for the 33rd time.

The flight of Ingenuity took just over 55 seconds and was part of the Perseverance rover mission. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California manages the missions of both in and out of the sky.

JPL officials said that if you look closely at the image, you'll see Ingenuity's leg and shadow.

Jezero Crater was once home to a lake and a river delta. Later in the 2020s, NASA and the European Space Agency plan to launch a sample return mission to the region, which will use helicopter like Ingenuity to pick up samples from Perseverance and haul them to a rocket for a launch back to Earth.

Perseverance's cache of samples is crucial to understand the history of the Red Planet and the potential for life on Mars.

Perseverance met some challenges as it tried to perform a rock abrasion earlier in the week. JPL said the rock broke apart after the Martian surface reacted in an unexpected way.

Eleanor Moreland wrote in the post that they gained information about the cohesiveness and strength of the rock and had the chance to observe and compare both freshly broken and weathered rock surfaces.

"Thanks to the quick work of the science and engineers, a new target was selected for a successful burn just a few days later," Moreland said.

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