NASA Is Officially Sending an Aerial Drone to Titan and It's a Dream Come True

By George Dvorsky on 29 Jun 2019 at 4:00AM

With its oily black seas, hazy golden atmosphere, and electrically charged sand, Saturn’s moon Titan is one of the most intriguing objects in the solar system. Earlier today, NASA approved an exciting new mission that will send a tiny aerial drone to soar above Titan’s alien surface.

Called Dragonfly, the dual-quadrotor drone is the brainchild of the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL). The mission, announced by NASA at a press conference today, was chosen over the CAESAR, or Comet Astrobiology Exploration Sample Return, mission, which would’ve sent a spacecraft to retrieve surface samples from comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Both projects fall within NASA’s New Frontiers initiative, in which projects can deployed for $1 billion or less, but at the same time tackle questions with high scientific priority. These two projects were chosen out of an initial field of 12 proposals.

With all due respect to the CAESAR project and its associated Cornell University team, the Dragonfly mission was clearly the better choice. Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko was recently visited by the ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft, so it’s still very fresh in our minds. What’s more, the 2006 Stardust mission managed to return comet samples to Earth. CAESAR, with all its charms, has a distinct been-there-done-that quality to it. It’s also doubtful a return mission to the comet would be stir public and scientific attention like a mission to a Saturnian moon.

Indeed, with this mission to Titan we’re in for a real treat. The tiny aerial drone—a dual-quadrotor—will zip from spot to spot, taking measurements and making observations, and all with a bird’s eye view of this incredible world. Flying through the moon’s dense nitrogen-heavy atmosphere, the probe will cover more territory in a few days than a six-wheeled rover could cover in years. Like recreational drones here on Earth, the craft will be able to take off and land vertically.

More:
https://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2019/06/nasa-is-officially-sending-an-aerial-drone-to-titan-and-its-a-dream-come-true/