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"Survives first freezing night" == Is this just sensationalism? Should NASA not have a good estimate of what the chances of survival are? Maybe it is the media,

"Survives first freezing night" == Is this just sensationalism? Should NASA not have a good estimate of what the chances of survival are? Maybe it is the media, maybe it is the need to fill columns (like the old days) but I would probably make a list of milestones and track "time to first flight" or something similar.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
qchris 5y ago
This is a technology demonstration of a novel robotics system build using many off-the-shelf parts, on a planet with night-time temperatures as low as -130F [1]. Ingenuity survived, literally, a first freezing night. That is an accomplishment by itself, and is hardly sensationalist. [1] As linked in the article: https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter/status/288/its-cold-on-mars/ https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter/status/288/its-c...
- mseepgood 5y ago
  > on a planet with night-time temperatures as low as -130F For anyone reading this: -130F is -90°C
galacticaactual 5y ago
It is literally a milestone on a list of milestones. https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits/mars_2020/launch/mission/spacecraft/experimental_technologies/ https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits/mars_2020/launch/mi...
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  Wow, reading the first comment I would think that this was planned. It literally is the third thing on a list of "milestones."
- amelius 5y ago
  I find the order of milestones a little surprising. Why didn't they test the survival of the freezing cold after testing the rotor blades, lift-off and perhaps a short flight in the vicinity of the rover?
  - thelean12 5y ago
    It's probably as simple as: they didn't have time. You have to move slowly and carefully on Mars. One rushed mistake and it's over.
    - amelius 5y ago
      Yes, but chances of getting useful data out of the helicopter are much greater if you test the thing before subjecting it to harsh conditions. For example: if you know that lift-off works, then that's a huge datapoint.
      - thelean12 5y ago
        I bet they'd move faster if they could. I'm guessing for takeoff there's a good amount of analysis to do beforehand. Terrain, weather, system checks, whatever. I don't know the actual list, but it's not hard to guess why they couldn't do everything, including ejecting it from the main rover and getting the main rover out of the way, in the ~12-14 hours a day that they have to do stuff.
  - jacobreg 5y ago
    They don't want to fly it with the rover nearby. It needs to get to a safe distance before they can fly it.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    They fully expect it to survive the night - it'll have survived identical conditions in pre-launch testing - and thus there's no need to rush through the other steps.
    - 5y ago
ortusdux 5y ago
2/3rds of Ingenuity's stored energy goes towards keeping its batteries and critical components warm each night. Only 1/3rd is available for powered flight. It literally takes more energy for this helicopter to survive the night than it takes to fly on mars.
- namrog84 5y ago
  I'm not sure how to really internalize this. Does it take a ton of power to heat. Or does it take very little power to fly? I'd assume there is a ton of effort put into passive insulation? Since my non intuitive gut seem like it should be able to better insulate heat loss. I can't help but feel like there is probably a ton of effort and science to insulate. And this is even only possible because of that work. But is it just a much harder problem than I probably realize?
  - InitialLastName 5y ago
    -130F/-90C is VERY cold, and this system is VERY weight-sensitive. Presumably adding more insulation that always needed to be carried was more weight than adding power capacity that can serve a dual-use. The power capacity metric isn't necessarily concurrent; one could imagine the chopper using its power to fly (which will generate heat as a byproduct) for a third of the sunlight time, and then using the rest of the day to charge for the night-time cold.
    - p1mrx 5y ago
      > one could imagine the chopper using its power to fly (which will generate heat as a byproduct) for a third of the sunlight time This is impossible; the flight duration is ~ 90 seconds.
      - InitialLastName 5y ago
        It could still take a third of its total daily accumulated power for said 90-second flight, no?
spuz 5y ago
No it's not - firstly, you can go to JPL's version of the story here and see how they lead with the same headline: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasas-mars-helicopter-survives-first-cold-martian-night-on-its-own https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasas-mars-helicopter-survives... But I prefer to hear it directly from the engineers involved: > "What was it like seeing that first image of Ingenuity on mars?" > "Oh it was a dream come true. To see the culmination of the entire team's hard work really pay off. Being dropped - that's one huge milestone, but the massive one for us over the last few days has been realising not only did we drop, but we actually survived the first night. That is huge. That was one of the huge huge achievements that we've been looking forward to and now we can look forward to the rest of the mission. But being able to drop under our own energy, sustain ourselves, keep ourselves warm through the whole night and then wake up and talk with Perseverance and say "yep we're here alive and healthy" the team couldn't be happier." https://youtu.be/PcpI8-S5ZE8?t=108 https://youtu.be/PcpI8-S5ZE8?t=108

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

qchris 5y ago

This is a technology demonstration of a novel robotics system build using many off-the-shelf parts, on a planet with night-time temperatures as low as -130F [1]. Ingenuity survived, literally, a first freezing night. That is an accomplishment by itself, and is hardly sensationalist. [1] As linked in the article: https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter/status/288/its-cold-on-mars/ https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter/status/288/its-c...

mseepgood 5y ago
> on a planet with night-time temperatures as low as -130F For anyone reading this: -130F is -90°C

galacticaactual 5y ago

It is literally a milestone on a list of milestones. https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits/mars_2020/launch/mission/spacecraft/experimental_technologies/ https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits/mars_2020/launch/mi...

whimsicalism 5y ago
Wow, reading the first comment I would think that this was planned. It literally is the third thing on a list of "milestones."
amelius 5y ago
I find the order of milestones a little surprising. Why didn't they test the survival of the freezing cold after testing the rotor blades, lift-off and perhaps a short flight in the vicinity of the rover?
- thelean12 5y ago
  It's probably as simple as: they didn't have time. You have to move slowly and carefully on Mars. One rushed mistake and it's over.
  - amelius 5y ago
    Yes, but chances of getting useful data out of the helicopter are much greater if you test the thing before subjecting it to harsh conditions. For example: if you know that lift-off works, then that's a huge datapoint.
    - thelean12 5y ago
      I bet they'd move faster if they could. I'm guessing for takeoff there's a good amount of analysis to do beforehand. Terrain, weather, system checks, whatever. I don't know the actual list, but it's not hard to guess why they couldn't do everything, including ejecting it from the main rover and getting the main rover out of the way, in the ~12-14 hours a day that they have to do stuff.
- jacobreg 5y ago
  They don't want to fly it with the rover nearby. It needs to get to a safe distance before they can fly it.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  They fully expect it to survive the night - it'll have survived identical conditions in pre-launch testing - and thus there's no need to rush through the other steps.
  - 5y ago

ortusdux 5y ago

2/3rds of Ingenuity's stored energy goes towards keeping its batteries and critical components warm each night. Only 1/3rd is available for powered flight. It literally takes more energy for this helicopter to survive the night than it takes to fly on mars.

namrog84 5y ago
I'm not sure how to really internalize this. Does it take a ton of power to heat. Or does it take very little power to fly? I'd assume there is a ton of effort put into passive insulation? Since my non intuitive gut seem like it should be able to better insulate heat loss. I can't help but feel like there is probably a ton of effort and science to insulate. And this is even only possible because of that work. But is it just a much harder problem than I probably realize?
- InitialLastName 5y ago
  -130F/-90C is VERY cold, and this system is VERY weight-sensitive. Presumably adding more insulation that always needed to be carried was more weight than adding power capacity that can serve a dual-use. The power capacity metric isn't necessarily concurrent; one could imagine the chopper using its power to fly (which will generate heat as a byproduct) for a third of the sunlight time, and then using the rest of the day to charge for the night-time cold.
  - p1mrx 5y ago
    > one could imagine the chopper using its power to fly (which will generate heat as a byproduct) for a third of the sunlight time This is impossible; the flight duration is ~ 90 seconds.
    - InitialLastName 5y ago
      It could still take a third of its total daily accumulated power for said 90-second flight, no?

spuz 5y ago

No it's not - firstly, you can go to JPL's version of the story here and see how they lead with the same headline: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasas-mars-helicopter-survives-first-cold-martian-night-on-its-own https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasas-mars-helicopter-survives... But I prefer to hear it directly from the engineers involved: > "What was it like seeing that first image of Ingenuity on mars?" > "Oh it was a dream come true. To see the culmination of the entire team's hard work really pay off. Being dropped - that's one huge milestone, but the massive one for us over the last few days has been realising not only did we drop, but we actually survived the first night. That is huge. That was one of the huge huge achievements that we've been looking forward to and now we can look forward to the rest of the mission. But being able to drop under our own energy, sustain ourselves, keep ourselves warm through the whole night and then wake up and talk with Perseverance and say "yep we're here alive and healthy" the team couldn't be happier." https://youtu.be/PcpI8-S5ZE8?t=108 https://youtu.be/PcpI8-S5ZE8?t=108