“The Mars Cruise Drone ” is similar to NASA’s Ingenuity, a helicopter that already has 13 flights in the thin Martian atmosphere.
China has announced it is working on a helicopter that seeks to fly on Mars, and its design is similar to the Ingenuity of NASA.
The ” Mars cruise drone “ was unveiled by the China National Space Science Center (NSSC) and maintained a simple design consisting of four legs, two stacked engines and a simple fuselage.
Of course, the comparison with Ingenuity, carried by the Perseverance robot to Mars, is never lacking in social networks, with many users finding all the similarities.
Ingenuity has managed 13 flights in the thin Martian atmosphere, holding the record for being the first to fly on another planet. The helicopter has already taken 72 13-megapixel colour images and 1,390 black-and-white navigation camera images.
China in space research
Regardless of how similar they are, the searching drone will investigate the Red Planet, especially since it will carry a spectrometer for aerial surveillance and study the geology of the star.
With a small multi-spectral sensing and imaging system, the ” Mars Surface Cruise Drone System “ is capable of imaging a large area within a radius of a few hundred meters in a single flight, allowing the rover to quickly grasp the surrounding terrain for safer and faster driving through precision guides, Bian Chunjiang, a researcher at the NSSC of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and chief scientist on the project, told the Global Times.
According to the organization, the researchers are considering adopting solar power or a wireless electricity charging method to control the Martian drone system or a combination of both.
China has sent rovers to the Moon and Mars and is currently building its space station, called Tiangong (“Celestial Palace”). More ambitiously, China hopes to send a human-crewed mission to Mars in 2033.