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Stories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.

Concepción crater

LPSC, Day 3: Opportunity, and what the heck is Marquette?

I wrote earlier about some results from Spirit reported at this year's Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston, Texas; here are the rest of my notes on rover-related talks, from Opportunity's site on the opposite side of Mars.

Solar system montage with eight planets

Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Spirit Parks for Winter, Opportunity Tastes Chocolate Hills

As winter put the freeze on in the southern hemisphere of the Red Planet, the Mars Exploration Rovers slowed down a bit, but continued throughout February to demonstrate the mettle that made them famous: Spirit successfully drove backwards, parked in place for the season, then continued working, as Opportunity roved through rock debris on a cruise around the rim of Concepcin Crater.

Google Mars: Pollack Crater

Find pics and track the rovers in Google Mars

I think a goodly proportion of you readers have already figured this out for yourselves since it was launched last March, but I didn't download and install it until last weekend, so this is new to me: Google Mars is awesome.

Mars Exploration Rover

That's a lot of motion for a "stuck" rover!

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory posted a video to YouTube today showing what seems to be a remarkable amount of motion out of Spirit lately, especially given that she's supposed to be a

Half of Concepcion crater

A pretty picture of Concepcion crater

It looks like the rover team thinks Concepcion is pretty enough (in both aesthetic and a scientific senses) to be worthy of the full-color Pancam panorama treatment; color frames started arriving on Earth over the weekend.

Solar system montage with eight planets

Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Rovers Pass 6-Year Milestone as Spirit Halts Extrication to Winter at Troy, Opportunity Cruises to Concepcion Crater

Five and a half years after they were supposed to be history, the Mars Exploration Rovers celebrated their sixth Earth year on the Red Planet with Opportunity pulling up to a fresh, new crater on the road to Endeavour, and Spirit working on repositioning itself to settle in for the coming Martian winter, and perhaps the rest of its mission.

Concepcion crater, Opportunity sol 2138

Opportunity's thousand-year-old crater

Since leaving Marquette Island on sol 2,122, Opportunity has been barreling southward on her journey toward Endeavour crater. On her horizon for the last several sols has been a very small but very fresh looking crater named Concepción.

Mars during the 2003 opposition

Awesome New Mars Flyovers

Check out these awesome flyovers of Mars, generated by Doug Ellison of UnmannedSpaceflight!

Mars Exploration Rover

NASA decides Spirit is henceforth to be a lander

There was a press briefing today that announced the official end of efforts to extricate Spirit from her sand trap at Troy. Instead, the rover drivers will now focus on improving the chances that Spirit will survive the coming winter so that she can carry on doing science once the power situation improves in the spring.

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