Nasa's Mars rover Spirit
26th January 2010.
Nasa’s hugely successful Mars rover Spirit is stuck in sand unable to move, and is now in it’s final resting place. It got into it’s tricky predicament last May and Nasa has been trying to free it ever since. But all efforts have come to nothing and the decision has been finally made to stop trying, and instead concentrate on using the rover as a static science station. Even though it can’t move it will continue to be very valuable. Spirit, like it’s twin rover Opportunity has made some very important discoveries and taken thousands of photos since landing on the red planet six years ago in January 2004.
Spirit’s first aim was the 170 kilometre wide Gusev Crater in Mars’ equatorial regions to search for signs of a watery past. Limited signs were found at first but it wasn’t until Spirit made the 2.5 kilometre drive to some nearby hills that rocks were found that had undergone extensive exposure to water in the past.
Spirit, like it’s sister rover Opportunity were originally designed for just a 90 day mission, but have both vastly surpassed this. The rover Opportunity is still mobile and driving around on the Martian soil.
