MARS: NASA announces details of first controlled flight on another planet.

It has found the site for its take-off and landing, as well as confirming that the test will begin in early April, it said during a briefing on the Ingenuity mission. The first flight will happen “no earlier than 8 April”, though that could move forward or back a few days, said Nasa’s Bob Balaram.

Ingenuity will not conduct scientific work during its journey. Instead, it is seen as a test of the technology, in the hope that it can inform future missions and help anticipate scientists’ and engineers’ needs in the future.

Nasa said that it had been scouring the surface of Mars for an “airfield” ahead of the launch, using satellite imagery and pictures taken from Perseverance. Engineers needed to pick somewhere safe both for taking off and landing and flying over, with enough texture for the helicopters’ cameras to pick up.

From the first powered, fixed-wing flight to the first helicopter flight on an alien world in just 118 years — most impressive.