Results from the First Year and a Half of Mars 2020 Robotic Operations

Mars 2020 Robotic Operations is responsible for the development, planning and Mars execution of robotics aspects of the mission. This includes the Perseverance rover’s mobility, manipulation, and sampling operations, and the Ingenuity helicopter’s flights. As of October 2022 (Martian Solar Day 562, or sol 562), the rover has driven 12101.7m and collected 15 samples, while the helicopter has logged 32 flights, covering 7281m, with an overall flight time of 3467 seconds. Perseverance and Ingenuity have accomplished several firsts such as coring and caching samples autonomously, and demonstrating powered flight on Mars. Perseverance has also set new planetary rover records such as the longest continuation drive distance (699.9m with no human review), longest single-sol autonomous drive distance (329m), and total autonomously evaluated drive distance (11,141m out of 12,409m total, i.e. 89\% of all driving, an order of magnitude more than previous NASA Mars rover missions). This paper presents results from the first year and a half of Mars operations to highlight the operations approach that enabled this success, the challenges encountered, and lessons learned.