NASA’s Dragonfly Mission Will Send A Drone To Saturn’s Moon In Search For Life

The National Aeronautics and Space Association (NASA) of the United States has announced a new mission called Dragonfly. This mission will send multiple sorties or drone-like aircraft to the Titan, one of Saturn’s natural satellites. The icy celestial body is the largest moon of Saturn and the second largest natural satellite in the solar system. It is also the only moon to have a dense atmosphere, which is why the Dragonfly mission is being sent to study clues of life.

NASA’s Dragonfly Mission

The Dragonfly Mission by NASA is scheduled to launch in the year 2026 and will take eight years to reach Titan in 2034. The rotorcrafts or drones will fly to dozens of locations on the satellite to look for prebiotic chemical processes, which are a link between Titan and Earth. It will mark the first time the organization will fly a multi-rotor vehicle on another celestial body. This device is claimed to have eight rotors and will fly like a normal drone or UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle). The moon is credited to have four times the dense atmosphere than of Earth; which will be taken advantage of by Dragonfly in flying its science equipment payload to new places for repeatable access to materials on the surface.

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The icy moon of Saturn is claimed to be the analogic representation of prehistoric Earth. During the 2.7 years long Mission Dragonfly, it will explore different environment factors; to search for the possibility of life. It is said that that the key to life once existed on Titan tens of thousands of years ago. So while the mission may or may not find the existence and sustenance of life there, it is said to give us the chemical evidence of the past or extant life on the moon.