#NASA drone lands on Mars for first flight on another world

It’s one giant leap for drone-kind.

The helicopter drone set to make humankind’s first flight on another planet has touched down on Mars, NASA said.

Photos show the four-legged contraption parked on the red planet’s surface — after hitching a ride there on NASA’s Perseverance rover — before it takes off on or around April 1 for the first of as many as five 90-second flights, the Verge reported.

The extra-light drone — named Ingenuity — will spend the days before its maiden voyage collecting energy from the sun to maintain operation during frigid Mars nights, NASA said in a statement last month.

When the chopper is ready to deploy, NASA’s team in California will take about six Mars days — just four Earth hours — to deploy the drone to elevate at a rate of three feet per second.

The drone takes eight hours to communicate its actions with its Earth-bound architects.

The craft will be able to hover about 10 feet aboveground for 30 seconds, NASA said.

If successful, the Ingenuity with be the first human-powered flight on a planet other than Earth.

NASA officials hope the technology will allow future researchers and space explorers a better view of the planet’s geography.

Temperatures on the planet can drop as low as -130° Fahrenheit, according to project chief engineer Bob Balaram. The extra-thin ground-level atmosphere makes flying especially difficult.