The Ingenuity helicopter that was on Mars lost contact for several days. Even NASA scientists panicked.
The mini helicopter lost contact with the NASA team for about six days. According to Ingenuity Chief Engineer Travis Brown, the incident of losing contact started after Ingenuity's 49th flight on April 2, 2023.
After the 49th flight data downlink, the Ingenuity team failed to send further instructions for the next flight. But according to Brown, Ingenuity's communication problem had been happening for several months before.
Shortly after the 40th flight in January 2023, Ingenuity began experiencing a brownout where the helicopter went into low-power mode in order to get through the extreme winter nights on Mars.
This communication disruption made it difficult for the NASA team to predict when Ingenuity would wake up from the brownout and plan its daily activities. This condition is aggravated by the rock structure that creates a 'communication shadow' between Ingenuity and the Perseverance rover that relays instructions to and from the helicopter.
But after Perseverance woke up from his sleep and was able to communicate, Ingenuity still could not be contacted. This situation began to make the NASA team panic.
"Poor telecommunications performance is seen as a reasonable explanation, but there are reasons to doubt it," said Brown, as quoted from Space, Monday (5/6/2023).
"In more than 700 sol operating helicopters on Mars, not once have we experienced a total radio outage. Even in the worst communication environment, we always see some indication of activity," he continued.
A sol, or a day on Mars, is slightly longer than a day on Earth with a duration of 24 hours and 40 minutes. Ingenuity began losing contact on sol 755 or April 5, and ended on sol 761. On sol 762, the NASA team received a second signal that confirmed the Ingenuity helicopter was still alive.
Ingenuity then made its 50th flight on a sol 763. The helicopter reached a height of 18 meters and beat the previous record. Ingenuity returned to flying on April 22 but has not flown since that date.
Ingenuity first landed on Mars in February 2021. The helicopter was originally planned to fly five times in tests, but during its two years on Mars Ingenuity managed to fly 51 times.