NASA Is Currently Assembling a Nuclear-Powered Octocopter in a Maryland Cleanroom that Is Scheduled to Reach Saturn's Moon Titan in 2034. Titan's Atmosphere Is More than Four Times as Dense as Earth's While Its Gravity Is only About One-Seventh as Strong—Conditions that Make Rotorcraft Flight Extraordinarily Efficient, with Ideal Hover Calculations Requiring Roughly 40 Times Less Power than on Earth.

NASA is currently assembling a nuclear-powered octocopter in a Maryland cleanroom that is scheduled to reach Saturn's moon Titan in 2034. Titan's atmosphere is more than four times as dense as Earth's while its gravity is only about one-seventh as strong—conditions that make rotorcraft flight extraordinarily efficient, with ideal hover calculations requiring roughly 40 times less power than on Earth.

Dragonfly is no longer just a spacecraft drawing or a rotor test article. NASA’s car-sized Titan aircraft now has a nearly four-metre flight fuselage, and engineers at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, are installing the mechanical, thermal and electrical systems that will turn it into a working spacecraft. The phrase “nuclear-powered octocopter” is accurate, but it needs one useful qualification. A radioisotope g…