Could this boomerang-shaped plane be the first to fly on Mars?

NASA wants to fly on Mars sometime in the 2020s, and has released the first potential aircraft prototype, which basically looks like a giant aluminum boomerang that can fly close to the surface of the Red Planet. Potential uses of the low-flying glider would be to snap high-resolution photos in an effort to map the planet's surface. This mapping data could then be used to identify ideal landing coordinates for a future manned Mars mission.

The craft would fold up small and ride in what's known as a CubeSat, a small cubed satellite designed for streamlined space research. In the NASA announcement, Al Bowers, NASA Armstrong chief scientist and Prandtl-m program manager, outlines the ongoing research from balloon flights in the outer atmosphere:

We could have one of two small science payloads on the Prandtl-m on that first balloon flight. It might be the mapping camera, or one might be a small, high-altitude radiometer to measure radiation at very high altitudes of Earth's atmosphere. Eventually the aircraft may carry both of them at the same time.

We will do the same thing again with a balloon flight to about the same altitude. On that mission Prandtl-m would actually be inside a CubeSat container. The balloon would drop the CubeSat container and then the aircraft would deploy from the container right after the drop, unfold and fly away.

The final test will be to bring the aircraft up to 450,000 and then drop it, watching as the glider descends to between 110,000 to 115,000 feet — an altitude that offers similar condition to how the craft would deploy above Mars. The glider would have to successfully complete all of these phases in order to be considered for inclusion in the Mars rover package set to be sent to Mars in 2022-2024.

The photo below shows how small the aircraft would actually be — it's more like a drone than a traditional airplane. Still, it would be quite the sight to see these drop out of a satellite and and deploy over the far reaches of Mars.