NASA zooms in on the final resting place for its dead Mars helicopter

NASA's Mars rover has pointed its instruments at the downed Ingenuity helicopter sitting in its final resting place.

The Mars helicopter was initially sent to the Red Planet as a technology demonstration with the goal of seeing if flight on another planet was possible. The demonstration was a success and Ingenuity became the first human-made object to take flight on another world.

The Mars helicopter went on to perform more than 70 additional flights, serving as a reconnaissance helicopter for the Perseverance rover. However, on flight 72, the helicopter had a rough landing, causing damage to its rotor blades and ultimately ending its mission.

The achievement of Ingenuity shouldn't be understated as flight on Mars is much harder than flight on Earth as the Red Planet's atmosphere is only 1% as dense as Earth's, meaning the rotor blades need to spin extremely fast to generate enough lift for flight.

Notably, Ingenuity's blades spun at 2,400 revolutions every minute. Now, geovisual designer Simeon Schmauß has used NASA imagery captured by Perseverance's Mastcam-Z to spy the lone helicopter in its final resting place.