Ingenuity measurements reveal surprising wind speeds on Mars

One of my gripes with “The Martian” movie was the depiction of the winds on Mars. The lower air density means that the sort of high speed winds we might experience on Earth carry far less of an impact on Mars. During its 72 flights in the Martian air, NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter took meticulous records of the conditions. A new paper has been released and reports upon the wind speeds on the red planet at various altitudes. Previous models suggested wind speeds would not exceed 15 m/s but Ingenuity saw speeds as high as 25 m/s.

Read Full Article