Category Archives: Mars

Mars, Opportunity rover

Opportunity Makes an Amazing Lifetime Achievement

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The Opportunity Rover Keeps on Going

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Opportunity rover on Mars–a composite of several images of the spacecraft taken by its camera. Courtesy NASA/Opportunity mission.

Last week marked Sol 5000 for the Opportunity Rover on Mars. It’s been rolling along ever since it landed there in January 2004, sending back images and data about the area around Endurance crater. Bear in mind that Opportunity (Mars Exploration Rover-B) was originally slated for a 90-day mission. But, like so many other NASA missions to other worlds, it has just gone on and on, like that famed Energizer Bunny. Now, it’s a “teenager” celebrating its 14th birthday on the dusty planet.

The rover has accomplished a lot in those 14 years, traveling more than 45 kilometers (28 miles) in all that time. It has survived dust storms, temperature shifts, and technical issues, all the while sending back a constant array of information. That’s a major accomplishment.

Long-term Exploration

Planetary scientists know that the best chances for getting complete details about a world’s conditions come from doing long-period studies. Doing a flyby gets you a quick snapshot. Sending a probe that lands moves around and samples the conditions gets you “ground truth.” Of course, it’s more expensive and time-consuming to do it that way, but it provides a very detailed look at a complex environment. It’s worth it, especially if future human missions land there and can take advantage of the rich data provided. Planetary science is no longer in the “plant the flag, grab some rocks, get your hiney back to Earth” stage. We’re maturing (we hope) as a scientific civilization, and can take the time needed to do it right.

In a decade, humans will head to Mars. Heck, they may train on the Moon. Before they go, like any other travelers who head to strange new places, they’ll need all the information they can get. That’s where teen-aged Opportunity, her sister Curiosity, and the various orbiters circling Mars will come in handy. I don’t know about you, but I were heading out to the wild unknown on Mars, I’d rather have it be a bit better “known.” So, here’s to Oppy. It’s been a great run and I hope it continues running for a long, long time.

Want to see everything Oppy and her sister ships have been doing? Check out the NASA Mars pages!

 

 

Mars

Looking Back at Earth from Another Planet

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Enjoy the View of Earth from Mars

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Two separate exposures of Earth and the Moon, taken on November 20, 2016, by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE camera.

During the AAS meeting, NASA released an amazing picture of Earth taken by the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter currently studying Mars.  We’ve all seen the “pinpoint in a pink sky” of Earth taken by one of the Mars rovers, but this one is the first to really show us what our home planet looks like from the orbit of Mars. I find it specially poignant to look at because, as Carl Sagan once said about the “pale blue dot” image taken by Voyager from the depths of the solar system, everyone we know, who has ever lived, is on that planet.

It’s really quite a view, when you think about it. In a few decades, it will be the view that human Martians will have, hopefully through a great ground-based telescope near their cities. What will they think about as they spy out the old home planet?  It’s an interesting future to contemplate as the next wave of Martian exploration is being planned to carry humans to Mars.