We need your help now
Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.
You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.
If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.
Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
By continuing, you are indicating that you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
ON 24 JANUARY 2004 NASA achieved the still rarefied feat of successfully landing a rover on Mars. Opportunity was only supposed to explors the Martian surface for 90 days but today, 10 years on, it has driven driven for 40 km and is still going.
One of its six wheels and two instruments stopped working long ago. It has an arthritic joint. Its flash memory occasionally suffers a senior moment, but it is still going.
Opportunity’s twin, Spirit, stopped working in 2010 after getting stuck in some Martian sand.
Their original goal was simple, to investigate whether there were once large bodies of standing water on the Red Planet.
Kevin Nolan of the the Institute of Technology Tallaght and the Irish coordinator the Planetary Society, says their success was almost immediate:
Within just months of landing on the surface Spirit had verified that the 100km wide crater it landed in was indeed a vast lake in its early history, Opportunity’s landing was nothing short of remarkable. It scored a ‘cosmic hole in one’ by inadvertently landing within a tiny 22m wide crater upon a vast flat plain called Meridiani Planum, suspected to have been a sea on Mars billions of years ago.
When Opportunity sent back images from the Meridiani Planum, the structure and salt deposits shown verified for that it had indeed been a sea on Mars billions of years ago.
John Callas, Mars Exploration Rovers project manager. (Pic: AP Photo/Reed Saxon)
Since then, Opportunity has survived four Martian winters at temperatures below -100 degrees Celsius and trekked for three years across 20 km of sandy plains to its current location at the rim of Endeavour Crater.
“It has been reprogrammed from Earth to be an autonomous artificial–intelligent ‘thinking machine’ capable of planning excursion and scientific investigations on its own and without instruction from Earth,” explains Nolan.
The power levels on the solar-powered rover have unexpectedly improved and a recent selfie by Opportunity showed dust on its solar panels wiped away by blowing winds.
(Youtube / NASA)
In 2012, Opportunity was joined on Mars by Curiosity, which is currently rolling across bumpy terrain toward a mountain.
With snazzy tools like a laser, Curiosity quickly became the world’s favorite rover.
But Opportunity snatched some of the attention back earlier this month when it discovered a rock shaped like a jelly doughnut that suddenly appeared in its field of view, probably after its wheel kicked it up. Scientists said it’s unlike any rock they’ve seen on Mars before.
It costs about $14 million a year to maintain Opportunity and NASA periodically reviews missions that have been extended to decide where to invest scarce dollars.
In several months, Opportunity will decamp from its winter haven and head south to what scientists are calling the mother lode a clay-rich spot that should yield more discoveries.
- Additional reporting was provided by Associated Press.
More information on Opportunity and its ten years on Mars can be found on the official NASA mission website.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
I’m getting a set of them tyres for the landcruiser next time
Mars is full of displaced young irish looking for work.The irish governments contribution to the space race. Thats to create space, at home, that is
Cop on. This is nothing to do with unemployment.
Why bother looking for life on Mars ? Wouldn’t it be better to spend all that money trying to fix the problems we have here on Earth first ?
No. You earthlings are destined to self destruct. Time to plan my escape.
Exploration is the point.
If the human race never did that then you would be sitting in a mud hut wondering what time you should go out to hunt for dinner.
If we could sort out planet earth’s problems, space exploration would be a lot easier.
@ Mary – Well for one it is not a lot of money being spent on it. The budget of NASA is half a cent on every tax dollar.
As for “Why bother looking for life on Mars?”. As a result of space exploration these are just some of the things that have benefited humanity:
Teflon-coated fiberglass developed in the 1970s as a new fabric for astronaut spacesuits has been used as a permanent roofing material for buildings and stadiums worldwide.
A joint National Bureau of Standards/NASA project directed at the Johnson Space Center resulted in a lightweight breathing system for firefighters. Now widely used in breathing apparatuses, the NASA technology is credited with significant reductions in inhalation injuries to the people who protect us.
NASA’s “Software of the Year” award went to Internet-based Global Differential GPS (IGDG), a C-language package that provides an end-to-end system capability for GPS-based real-time positioning and orbit determination. Developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory
And lastly water purification is also now possible as a result of space exploration.
So with that in mind yes this is important and we benefit from it.
If you have to even ask why we are looking for life on other planets I doubt you’ll ever actually understand.
Without Space exploration you would not have a nice jet to fly to Lanzoroti every summer.
Will China go to mars
There must be life on Mars.. Who else would have fixed the solar panels on Rover..?
Is there life on Earth or are you all just fleshed out robots here to serve the Banksters and make sure they have a nice comfortable life? What about the message of Jesus? Do we have anyone on Earth willing to do the right thing anymore?
Jesus came from Mars
“Choose not the path of robotics and thou shalt oppose the tyranny of the wretched bankers at every turn”
Ezequiel 23:14
My favourite message of Jesus: “Judge not lest ye be judged.” You seem to have forgotten that one yourself.
Ignoreland I find it very easy to ignore you, but I will take pity on you on this occasion. Just tell me the name of the person that I judged.
KM, I like that one. :-)
Patricia I hope you get the help you need.
Looks like Helmand province,just haven’t seen any AL Quida yet bet they’re hiding in those darn hills.
Can we send the bondholders to Mars?
I’ll get me coat!
Then, perhaps, is there fossils or life on mArs, life expressions elsewhere,? But, isn’t the emergence and maintenance of life a process of radical contingency? That is, is a unique and unrepeatable past totally necessary? Or does life emerge through space like mushrooms when some conditions are present? So, how many conditions are necessary: three, four, trillions, infinite? Only one, water or any sort of God? Is God the word that means infinite conditions, absolute necessity? Anyway, how did the life that emerge in a given conditions resist when switching to a different moment? How does life resist time itself, the effects of entropy? But, is it possible for human beings to recognise a simpler life than their own brain only? On the other hand, beyond likeness, is it possible to recognise a complex life than their brain, is this the extra-terrestrial life that some people are searching unsuccessfully? However, is there an origin of life or would it be as finding a cut in the material history of the universe, an infinite void that human language patches now? Along these lines, there is a peculiar book, a short preview in http://goo.gl/rfVqw6 Just another suggestion, far away from dogmas or axioms.
Drugs
Jean Paul, stop doing the drugs then. Some people have consciousness despite your difficulty in comprehending what consciousness is.
have your say