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by John_KZ 2962 days ago
They are, but this is a disaster waiting to happen anyway. Extremely high RPM, no redundancy in rotors or engines, flying in an environment full of dust and particles, having to land perfectly every time (or get damaged irreversibly), all these things add up to certain failure. It's definitely very cool, but it's not going to be nearly as reliable or useful as a land-based vehicle. Besides, aerial photos have generally little value for Mars (at least for the surface area such a drone can cover) because the atmosphere is clear and you can get great imagery from space.

So unless they want to reach an otherwise impossible to climb location, I don't see the use for it.
1 comments
andbberger 2962 days ago
> Besides, aerial photos have generally little value for Mars (at least for the surface area such a drone can cover) because the atmosphere is clear and you can get great imagery from space.

I'm not buying your blanket statement. Atmosphere is not the only limitation - optics are heavy.

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John_KZ 2962 days ago
>optics are heavy

It depends on the optics. Modern optics for the visual range are incredibly light.

Also, since you assume optics are heavy, why do you think putting them on a drone is a good idea? You can haul a metric ton of optics in space for years (if not decades) but that drone can probably carry a handful of kg of equipment, and not that many cameras.

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andbberger 2961 days ago
My point is that you can't just conclude a prior that the capabilities could be matched by an orbiter. You need bigger and thus heavier optics to match the performance of a camera on the ground from orbit. The extra mass for the drone might be less than that needed for the larger optics.
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