A helicopter has made the first ever flight on another planet, NASA has said.

The Ingenuity mini-helicopter took to the Martian skies this morning, the space agency said.

It marks NASA’s first attempt at a powered, controlled flight on another planet.

Data from the flight will return from Mars to Earth in a few hours’ time.

NASA’s Perseverance rover provided support during flight operations, taking images, collecting environmental data, and hosting the base station that enabled the helicopter to communicate with mission controllers on Earth.

The original flight date of 11 April was postponed as engineers worked on pre-flight checks and a solution to a command sequence issue.

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