I Pilot NASA’s Mars Helicopter. Here’s What the Job Is Like, My Advice

• Håvard Grip pilots NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, which has flown 40 instances on Mars.
• Flying the primary interplanetary drone is like enjoying a strategic online game (not the joystick sort).
• That is Grip’s account of his job at NASA’s JPL, as informed to reporter Morgan McFall-Johnsen.

This as-told-to essay is predicated on a dialog with Håvard Grip, who’s the chief pilot for the Ingenuity Mars helicopter at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It has been edited for size and readability.

I could not pilot a helicopter right here on Earth, however I do it on Mars on a regular basis.

I am the chief pilot for NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, which landed on Mars with the Perseverance rover in February 2021. On the time, I used to be fairly sure the helicopter was solely going to make as much as 5 flights. And if we bought 5 flights, man, I’d be overjoyed.

As we speak, we have flown the helicopter 40 instances. It has been a completely completely different factor than I dared to think about. I can virtually consider something that you simply inform me Ingenuity can do, as a result of it simply retains going.

I like my job. It is somewhat uncommon and somewhat completely different than piloting an plane on Earth, partly as a result of it is so far.

It takes about 5 to twenty minutes to ship a message to Mars. Which means every thing strikes on a slower timeline. The execution of a single flight takes a number of days. It isn’t a real-time factor. You are not sitting and joy-sticking one thing and taking a look at it.

It is like a really specific form of strategic online game, maybe. It is serious about the entire eventualities and gathering the entire info and making very cautious selections. As a result of when it is sport over, it is sport over.

There is not any recovering a crashed helicopter on Mars.

—NASA JPL (@NASAJPL) January 12, 2023

I landed at JPL and stumbled into Mars helicopters

After I’m not on Mars time, I get up, eat a breakfast of bread and cheese, and go to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory round 9 a.m.

I’m not a morning particular person. I want my huge Starbucks-sized espresso. However JPL is nice. It is form of distinctive for a NASA heart as a result of it is so compact. It is extra like a university campus in some methods.

I like seeing colleagues face-to-face and having high quality conversations, so the density is a plus for me. In my part, I am surrounded by those that work on different Mars missions and a few orbiters.

I began off doing numerous educational work earlier than I landed at JPL in 2013 — not a lot by design. It is simply a chance that got here round, after which we have been doing helicopters.

I used to be there from the very starting, after we first had the concept to attempt to fly a helicopter on Mars. Bob Balaram got here up with the idea.

Then Bob began growing the concept for Ingenuity. I used to be working with him on the time, on an concept to seize an asteroid from area and produce it again to Earth. I assume he noticed one thing in me that made him give me the job of main the flight controls for the helicopter. I am glad he took that gamble.

The primary flight in April 2021 was probably the most thrilling

After Perseverance dropped Ingenuity to the floor of Mars, we have been on a really tight schedule. We had a 30-day window to finish our mission of as much as 5 flights.

We labored on a Mars schedule on the time, shifting our days 40 minutes per day to maintain our work hours aligned with daylight hours on Mars. We needed to work when Ingenuity was within the solar.

On the day of the primary flight, we up-linked the flight plan within the daytime, after which within the afternoon tried to fall asleep for a number of hours. I did not get any sleep. Then I bought up round midnight to go to work and get the primary knowledge again from Ingenuity.

I arrived at JPL round 1 a.m. and sat within the operations room with different crew leaders.

We have been trembling. We might come all this fashion and it may all simply go improper in a second.

Then we noticed plots and pictures that regarded eerily just like the flights we might been doing in simulation for 4 years. Now we have been seeing it in actual life for the primary time. I used to be enormously relieved.

Then we tried to assemble as a lot knowledge as doable in preparation for a press convention and a name with the president. That was a protracted stretch. It was all fairly thrilling.

How we fly a helicopter on Mars

Flights now look somewhat extra mundane.

My crew, we make the large selections right here on Earth. We take a look at no matter state of affairs we’re in. What is the climate like? What is the terrain like the place we’re and the place we’re going? Are there areas the place we are able to land? What is the functionality of the plane? Can we climb at a sure charge? How a lot vitality do we’ve to go from level A to level B? And so forth.

That is the start line. Then we are able to get right down to planning the precise particulars of the flight. Principally each maneuver that the helicopter takes, we sit and design right here on Earth.

Then we’ve fairly subtle software program that permits us to attempt it out in simulation. We are able to actually see the helicopter flying over terrain that replicates the actual Mars terrain it should be flying over, and we search for points. We do not wish to fly over, say, a crater as a result of it would disturb the navigation. So we’d need to plan a path round that.

We do that planning over days and weeks.

As soon as we’ve a path we’re glad with, we put this right into a small snippet of code that encodes exactly how we wish Ingenuity to fly. Then we radiate it off, and all we are able to do at that time is to sit down and watch for it to occur and get knowledge again.

At that time, it is Ingenuity’s job to make small selections to make that occur. It is aware of what we wish it to do. Because it begins flying, 500 instances per second it reevaluates: The place am I? The place ought to I be? And it makes these tiny little changes repeatedly with the intention to keep on that path.

In fact, a part of my job is taking a look at how did it go afterwards. Usually inside a day or so, we get knowledge again from the helicopter. That is the second of fact, at all times. That is after we assess the success of the flight. We’ve got realized lots. Generally we make changes for the subsequent flight.

This is my recommendation if you need a job like mine

I by no means tried to discover a profession in Mars helicopters. I wasn’t even that excited about Mars. Lots of people on this enterprise have grown up dreaming about area. I am simply not a type of folks. Generally it is simply the place life takes you.

Nonetheless, in the event you’re speaking about my form of job, I believe it is apparent you must have some curiosity.

One of many greatest issues for me is with the ability to mix theoretical data with sensible expertise, particularly when it comes to software program growth. That is a really highly effective mixture, as a result of it means you are able to do the maths and, as a substitute of making an attempt to persuade another person to do your concept, you may construct one thing by way of software program.

Lots of people are good on the principle, however not really doing one thing virtually. And vice versa.

So that might be my huge advice: Attempt to do each.

An effective way to get a foot within the door at JPL is an internship. We’ve got numerous internships within the summers. It is a strategy to get to know what we’re doing, what the wants are, and set up connections to folks.

Ingenuity will finish, however I will nonetheless be engaged on Mars helicopters

There are a number of methods Ingenuity’s mission may finish. One, after all, is crashing. It may simply land on a rock, and that’ll be it.

It is also doable that it stops working in much less spectacular methods. Perhaps it would not get up one morning, as a result of there was a solder joint that went unhealthy.

It is arduous to say how I will really feel when the mission ends. I do not consider the helicopter as a being with a persona, or something like that. However it’s one thing I’ve labored with a very long time, so I am positive there’s going to be some feelings.

My job will not go away when Ingenuity ends, although. I am additionally the chief engineer for the helicopters that may go to Mars in a couple of decade to gather the samples the Perseverance rover is stashing there, and produce them again to Earth.

In my position as a chief engineer for these restoration helicopters, I attempt to put on a giant hat and take a look at the venture as a system, and take a look at to verify folks on the subsystem degree are doing the fitting factor in a coordinated trend. It is numerous conferences and speaking to folks, not a lot writing code like I did with Ingenuity.

We’re in an early design section for the brand new helicopters. The essential design now seems like Ingenuity with wheels and an arm. However there’s heaps and many work to do. That’s the subsequent huge factor.