A Note about the blog posts from the future [CE 2224]: In January of 2021, with Perseverance due to land on Mars the next month, NASA activated their experimental Quantum Transmitter. The transmitter was designed to communicate with Perseverance, without regard to location and at faster than light speeds—near real-time. Unfortunately, they lost the connection after the initialization routine was completed. However, as an unintended consequence, NASA connected with a specific locus in the space-time continuum located on the Moon in 2224. That locus was the storage device of the quantum computer of a popular blog site. It is from that blog site that these blog entries are extracted. I hope you enjoy a peek into our future, and hopefully, I’m not violating some temporal directive. So far, no visit from the time cops.
Guest Author: Dr. Khaled Al Otaiba, Director of Education Outreach, Space Systems Technologies (SST), Arsia Mons, Mars
Posted: Monday, April 19, 2224 (Earth Standard Calendar)
Again this year, Space Systems Technologies is a proud sponsor of Ingenuity Day here in the city. School projects and the STEM Education fair are featured on the university campus at various venues. Displays and demonstrations from SST and other technology companies are showcased in the Central Plaza, and I hope everyone has a chance to visit the exhibitors throughout the week.
This year we have an exciting new contribution to the event. The university engineering students, funded by a grant from SST, have recreated the original Ingenuity for which this day is named. The Ingenuity II is not an exact replica, as the electronics and battery technology no longer exists, but they’ve built to the exact specifications and constraints. They’ve even converted the original flight management software to run on current processors. They hope to “fly” their version at the closing ceremonies on Friday. They hope it goes as well as the first flight of Ingenuity two hundred and three Earth years ago today.
Ever since that first flight, ingenuity has been the hallmark of Martian progress. SST has been a leader in this area and supports continuing development of Arsia Mons and the outlying settlements. Although founded on Luna over one hundred and fifty Earth years ago, it was on Mars where SST and others developed the ingenious solutions that allowed us to gain a permanent foothold on the Red Planet.
And it all began with that first helicopter flight on Mars this day, April 19th in CE 2021.
Here’s some archive footage from the original NASA of that first historic flight – Ingenuity Flight.
Following that groundbreaking achievement, the early explorers deployed swarms of drones across the planet, expanding their detailed map, discovering resources, and scouting settlement locations. SST still uses drones to explore and plan settlements, manufacturing locations, and mag-lev routes.
Once again, let’s pause and commemorate the tremendous accomplishments of the original Ingenuity team and acknowledge our debt of gratitude for their pioneering spirit and willingness to Dare Mighty Things. Thanks for stopping by, and I hope you get a chance to view the launch of Ingenuity II on Friday.