NASA’s Mars Ingenuity helicopter made history early Monday when the small but intrepid drone became the first powered craft to fly on another world, space agency officials announced. The man behind the mission is Indian-origin engineer Bob Balaram who has worked with Nasa for 20 years.

With this success, Nasa marked it as a 21st-century Wright Brothers moment on Monday. Ingenuity Mars helicopter is the first powered, controlled flight by an aircraft over the surface of another planet.

Bob Balaram who was the chief engineer, is an IIT-Madras alumnus from the 1975-80 batch.

After IIT-Madras, Bob Balaram did his MS, Computer and System Engineering from America's oldest technological research university Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and also completed his PhD from the institute.

Balaram is the second prominent engineer of Indian-origin to feature in Nasa's Mars Mission after Swati Mohan, who is the lead operations engineer of the Mars Rover Perseverance.

The Apollo Moon landing mission had developed his interest in space and science.

Bob Balaram is now working with NASA its Jet Propulsion Laboratory as a Chief Engineer for Mars Helicopter Scout Project.

Balaram has also worked in robotic arms, early Mars rovers, technology for a notional balloon mission to explore Venus and a stint as lead for the Mars Science Laboratory entry, descent and landing simulation software. But it is his physics background that helped him envision flying on Mars.

Overcoming extreme cold, dangerously thin air and flawed flight software, the $85 million autonomous copter spun its twin carbon fibre rotor blades to rise about 10 feet into the thin Martian air. It hovered briefly in the breeze before safely landing at about 3:30 a.m. ET Monday back on Earth, NASA officials said. The flight was the first of five planned for the next 30 days.

Image Source: India Times