NASA's Mars helicopter Ingenuity is the first aircraft ever to fly on the Red Planet.
It launched to the red world in the summer of 2020 on NASA's Perseverance rover as part of the agency's Mars 2020 mission. They landed together on Feb. 18, 2021 in Jezero Crater — an ancient delta that scientists think could hold evidence of past life — on the surface of Mars.
The Ingenuity helicopter recently has captured a unique birds-eye perspective of the gear that helped land the Perseverance rover on Mars.
During its one-year anniversary flight on April 19, the little chopper took photos of the striped parachute used during Perseverance's landing -- often referred to as "7 minutes of terror" because it happens faster than radio signals can reach Earth from Mars -- on February 18, 2021. It also spotted the cone-shaped backshell that helped protect the rover and Ingenuity on the trip from Earth to Mars and during its fiery, plunging descent to the Martian surface.
Previously, we've only seen images of the discarded landing gear from a rover's perspective, like an image taken by Perseverance showing the parachute and backshell from a distance. Aerial images, captured for the first time by Ingenuity from 26 feet (8 meters) in the air, provide more detail.
"Perseverance had the best-documented Mars landing in history, with cameras showing everything from parachute inflation to touchdown," said Ian Clark, former Perseverance systems engineer and current Mars Sample Return ascent phase lead at JPL, in a statement.
"But Ingenuity's images offer a different vantage point. If they either reinforce that our systems worked as we think they worked or provide even one dataset of engineering information we can use for Mars Sample Return planning, it will be amazing. And if not, the pictures are still phenomenal and inspiring."
The orange and white parachute can be seen, covered in dust, but the canopy doesn't show any damage. It was the biggest parachute used on Mars to date, at 70.5 feet (21.5 meters) wide. The team will continue to analyze the images to determine if the parachute experienced any changes over the next several weeks.
During Ingenuity's 26th aerial excursion, the chopper flew a total of 1,181 feet (360 meters). So far, it has logged 49 minutes of total flight time and traveled 3.9 miles (6.3 kilometers) over the past year.
The helicopter and rover have arrived at an ancient river delta where water once flowed into Jezero Crater millions of years ago.
The imposing delta rises more than 130 feet (40 meters) above the crater floor and is riddled with boulders, pockets of sand and jagged cliffs -- and it could be the best place to search for signs of ancient life if it ever existed on Mars.
Ingenuity has the crucial task of surveying two dry river channels to see which one Perseverance should use to climb to the top of the delta. It can also share images of features that could become potential science targets for the rover.