Welcome, I'm at Kaplan of the Planetary Society with more of the

human adventure across our solar system and beyond. That was the scene in a room at

the Jet Propulsion Lab very, very early on Monday, April 19th, as the Mars

helicopter ingenuity team learned that its years of work had led to a successful

flight on the red planet. More ingenuity coverage is minutes away. We'll also

sit down with two researchers who believe they have found a better explanation,

a purely natural explanation for that interstellar visitor called Oumuamua.

Later we'll join Bruce Betz for an especially fun what's up and your chance to

win the Mars Pocket Atlas. Another region of Mars tops the April 16 edition of

the downlink. It's a Mars Odyssey Orbiter false-color image of the planet's

polar cap that reveals ice among dunes that look like loosely woven fabric. You

can see it and much more at planetary.org slash downlink including these

stories. The gigantic multi-layered sun shield on the James Webb Space Telescope

has been neatly folded away. Much like how we packed the thin sale of our tiny

light-sale spacecraft though on a far larger scale, that shield won't unfold

again till the JWST is in space. Osiris Rex has made its final close pass over

Bennu. It will depart the asteroid on May 10 heading for its climactic sample

return to Earth in the fall of 2023. And Blue Origin ran another flawless test of

its new shepherd spacecraft. The capsule was boarded by a test crew that exited

before launch. It was a run-through of the upcoming mission that may finally take

passengers on a sub-orbital flight. Godspeed, folks.

It's Friday, April 9. NASA and JPL have decided that ingenuity will attempt the first flight

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