{"id":543163,"date":"2026-07-10T18:47:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T18:47:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/543163\/"},"modified":"2026-07-10T18:47:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T18:47:15","slug":"firefly-to-leverage-carbon-fiber-composites-for-aeroshell-in-skyfall-mars-mission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/543163\/","title":{"rendered":"Firefly to Leverage Carbon Fiber Composites for Aeroshell in SkyFall Mars Mission"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Rendering <\/a><\/p>\n

Rendering of aeroshell for NASA SkyFall mission to Mars. Source | Firefly Aerospace<\/p>\n

Firefly Aerospace<\/a>\u00a0(Cedar Park, Texas, U.S.)\u00a0has received a $13 million subcontract from NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) to manufacture, test\u00a0and deliver the aeroshell for NASA\u2019s SkyFall mission to Mars<\/a>, targeted for launch in late 2028. The SkyFall mission, managed by JPL, will deploy three heritage Mars helicopters to perform science and demonstrate airborne subsurface mapping and resource prospecting, paving the way for U.S. astronauts on Mars.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNASA\u2019s SkyFall is Firefly\u2019s first award coming out of our new Gloworks innovation lab, which embodies our commitment to developing disruptive space technologies without disrupting our existing production lines,\u201d says Shea Ferring, Firefly CTO. \u201cOur expertise in building large composite structures for both spacecraft and rockets gives us an advantage to enable critical planetary missions like SkyFall. We\u2019re further innovating these core technologies through Gloworks to push the boundaries of what\u2019s possible and open new frontiers across our solar system.\u201d<\/p>\n

The SkyFall aeroshell, comprising both the backshell and heatshield, will be developed within the Gloworks innovation lab\u00a0and manufactured at the company\u2019s Rocket Ranch in Briggs, Texas. Firefly will use carbon fiber composites \u2014 the same materials used on its\u00a0Blue Ghost lunar landers, Elytra orbiters\u00a0and Alpha and Eclipse launch vehicles.<\/p>\n

Following manufacture, Firefly will complete rigorous structural qualification and flight acceptance testing to ensure the SkyFall aeroshell meets all mission requirements for the harsh environments encountered during launch, cruise\u00a0and Mars entry, descent, and landing. The company will then deliver the aeroshell to JPL for additional environmental testing at JPL\u2019s facilities prior to integration with JPL\u2019s SkyFall helicopters and deployment system.<\/p>\n

Built on the success of NASA\u2019s Ingenuity Mars helicopte<\/a>r, the SkyFall helicopters will be deployed using an innovative mid-air release technique known as the \u201cSkyFall Maneuver.\u201d This technique uses an entry capsule to release the three helicopters during descent, eliminating the need for a landing platform. The helicopters will then fly to the surface and capture high-resolution surface imagery and subsurface radar data. This data will be used to obtain a better understanding of the terrain and natural forces that shaped the landing site and scout for water ice.<\/p>\n

Firefly reports significant progress across multiple missions to the Moon, including four\u00a0upcoming lunar missions<\/a>\u00a0as part of NASA\u2019s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative. Firefly also recently\u00a0received a JPL subcontract<\/a>\u00a0to deliver four drones above the lunar south pole with its Elytra spacecraft in support of NASA\u2019s MoonFall mission.<\/p>\n

The company continues to ramp up spacecraft production and recently\u00a0doubled the size of its facilities<\/a>\u00a0in central Texas and expanded its spacecraft cleanroom to enable an assembly line of lunar landers and orbital vehicles in support of multiple missions a year to the Moon and beyond.<\/p>\n

Composite construction of NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter<\/a><\/p>\n

Ingenuity\u2019s airframe and rotor blades were built almost entirely from carbon fiber composites<\/a> supplied by Toray Advanced Composites<\/a>\u00a0(Morgan Hill, Calif., U.S.), which provided prepreg materials for both the structural airframe and the \u201chighly specialized\u201d\u00a0rotor blades \u2014 the same program that also supplied prepreg for the Perseverance rover’s landing deck structure.<\/p>\n

The rotor system consists of four specially made carbon fiber blades arranged into two 1.2-meter-long\u00a0counter-rotating rotors that spin at roughly 2,400 rpm, a design confirmed independently by JEC Composites<\/a>. Ingenuity\u2019s rotor system is made with four specially made carbon fiber blades arranged into two 4-foot-long (1.2-meter-long) counter-rotating rotors that spin at roughly 2,400 rpm. The blades themselves pair a carbon fiber skin with a lightweight foam core \u2014 a combination NASA and CBS News both describe as essential to generating lift in Mars\u2019 thin atmosphere\u00a0\u2014 constructed<\/a> from\u00a0TeXtreme<\/a>\u00a0(Bor\u00e5s, Sweden) materials.<\/p>\n

The four landing legs are also carbon fiber composite tubes rather than metal, each 0.384 meter\u00a0long, which gave\u00a0the helicopter about 13 centimeters\u00a0of clearance above the ground.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rendering of aeroshell for NASA SkyFall mission to Mars. Source | Firefly Aerospace Firefly Aerospace\u00a0(Cedar Park, Texas, U.S.)\u00a0has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":543164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[61,60,82],"class_list":["post-543163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=543163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/543164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=543163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=543163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=543163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}