NASA to launch two helicopters to bring back Martian rocks to Earth

US space agency NASA plans to launch two more mini helicopters to Mars to bring back Martian rocks and soil samples to Earth. The helicopters weighs just 4 pounds (1.8 kilograms) and would have wheels and the added ability of grabbing and transporting small tubes filled with Martian rock.

The helicopters will be modelled after NASA's successful mission Ingenuity, which has made 29 flights since arriving with Perseverance at Mars early last year. Perseverance Mars project has already gathered 11 samples with more rock drilling planned. The Perseverance rover has been drilling rock samples in the Mars crater named Jezero. Its focus is on a dried-up river delta along the crater rim, a prime location where signs of ancient life might be preserved.

If Perseverance breaks down, the two helicopters being built and launched later this decade would load the samples onto the rocket instead.


If all goes as planned, as many as 30 samples would blast off from Mars in 2031 and arrive at Earth in 2033.

Originally, Nasa had planned to send a rover built by the ESA to pick up the samples, but the design of the rover was becoming bigger, and it, along with that rocket, was getting too heavy to fit on one lander

The trip back to Earth would take a few more years, landing in a small capsule in 2033.