Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

Video & Multimedia

bananas

(27,509 posts) Mon Jan 26, 2015, 07:17 AM Jan 2015

Crazy Engineering: Mars Helicopter

Crazy Engineering: Mars Helicopter
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Published on Jan 22, 2015

JPL engineers are working on a small helicopter that could ‘scout’ a trail for future Mars rovers, but getting a chopper that could fly in the Martian atmosphere is tricky. Episode 2 of Crazy Engineering.

4 replies

= new reply since forum marked as read

Highlight:

Crazy Engineering: Mars Helicopter (Original Post) bananas Jan 2015 OP

Mars Helicopter g00dfella Jan 2015 #1

will not get funded unless it can carry missles dembotoz Jan 2015 #2

Planetary missions with no missiles get funded on a regular basis. drm604 Jan 2015 #4

Very cool. drm604 Jan 2015 #3

g00dfella

(14 posts)

1. Mars Helicopter

Reply to bananas (Original post)

Mon Jan 26, 2015, 08:26 AM

Jan 2015

Good Idea

dembotoz

(16,808 posts)

2. will not get funded unless it can carry missles

Reply to bananas (Original post)

Mon Jan 26, 2015, 08:53 AM

Jan 2015

its the amurican way

drm604

(16,230 posts)

4. Planetary missions with no missiles get funded on a regular basis.

Reply to dembotoz (Reply #2)

Mon Jan 26, 2015, 11:30 AM

Jan 2015

I understand your concerns about over-militarization but NASA regularly gets funded for all kinds of non-defense projects.

drm604

(16,230 posts)

3. Very cool.

Reply to bananas (Original post)

Mon Jan 26, 2015, 11:26 AM

Jan 2015

My first thought was why not just have a flying rover, but of course a rover with all of it's tools and instruments would weigh much more and be much more fragile than a simple autonomous drone, so this makes sense.

Reply to this discussion