I think the damage is worse than it initially appeared. I’ve been comparing the photo of the shadow of the damaged blade to those taken from Ingenuity’s downward-facing camera while in flight (the shadow of the aircraft, specifically). The blades have significant tapering towards the tips, making the ends very narrow.
The shadow of that ragged tip is much wider, and the blade much shorter than it should be. I think a good chunk of the end of the blade broke off. If true, the next question is if it broke before or after contact with the ground. Probably after, but some clear pictures from Perseverance would help.
On the other hand, Japan’s SLIM is more or less functioning even though it’s on its side from how it’s supposed to be, and both its rovers are active. It’s not built to last the night though, which starts tomorrow.
Has it been that long already? I thought they had another week of sun where it landed… They did get lucky the way it tipped over that the solar panels were facing the direction the sun would be setting.
I’m still interested in hearing why one of the descent engine bells broke off during the landing sequence, resulting in SLIM rolling onto its nose upon landing. Scott Manley’s hypothesis is that that engine was running oxidizer-rich and the excess oxidizer ate away at the throat until it just cracked off under the pressure, causing a thrust imbalance.
“ TOKYO, Feb 26 (Reuters) - Japan’s space agency said on Monday its SLIM moon lander has unexpectedly survived a freezing lunar night and re-established communication with the earth, more than a month after the spacecraft made a historic “pinpoint” touchdown on the moon.”
Woo-hoo! I figured that if SLIM survived the night we’d hear from it about now — 28 days after it woke up the first time when the sun finally hit its solar panels.
That’s the most amazing thing to me. It’s like when Hubble was pointed at a spot above the Big Dipper that looked like there was nothing. Not a special location and look at what they found! Same with Kepler. Just a single small area of the sky and they found thousands of planets!
