Mars rover arrives at crater's rim

[Omaroo]

From: http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,20489996-1702,00.html

[ving]

gee! i had no idea the rovers were still going!!! what a wonder of workmanship!

thanks chris :)

[Ric]

You just cant stop the little devils, they are really works of art.
I read an article somewhere that they have now supplied geologists with enough data to keep them quiet for at least another ten years.

cheers

[Jupiter]

All they need to find is a fossil in the rock strata and then watch the world go crazy.

[Ric]

Yep, a fossil would make my life complete. A fish would do nicely indicating a nice evolutionary process had been taking place.

cheers

[h0ughy]

exciting stuff, especially when going overthe top

[gaa_ian]

Awesome stuff, kind of like being there at a great moment of discovery for say Bourke & Wills in the desert !

[Blue Fire]

Simply awesome, amazing stuff - those pics that Opportunity is still sending back are unbelievable! But my old back is beginning to get strained from being on the edge of my seat for so long in anticipation of some little scrap of life evidence. ;) I've been around since those first missions to Mars and I've been glued to NASA ever since. But with the discoveries being made fast and furious with the other planets and their moons, I can't help but wonder if our chances of finding evidence for at least past life are better with Titan or Saturn's moon Enceladus where they detected water geyers.

[spacezebra]

I am totally amazed that they are still going - what was their original life span?

Anyone know?

Cheers Petra

[[1ponders]]

About 90 days I think Petra :lol: Ya just can't keep a good Rover down :)

[Omaroo]

Photos in....

1) This view of "Victoria crater" is looking southeast from "Duck Bay" towards the dramatic promontory called "Cabo Frio." The small crater in the right foreground, informally known as "Sputnik", is about 20 meters (about 65 feet) away from the rover, the tip of the spectacular, layered, Cabo Frio promontory itself is about 200 meters (about 650 feet) away from the rover, and the exposed rock layers are about 15 meters (about 50 feet) tall. This is an approximately true color rendering of images taken by the panoramic camera (Pancam) on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity during the rover's 952nd sol, or Martian day, (Sept. 28, 2006) using the camera's 750-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 430-nanometer filters.

2) This view of Victoria crater is looking north from "Duck Bay" towards the dramatic promontory called "Cape Verde." The dramatic cliff of layered rocks is about 50 meters (about 165 feet) away from the rover and is about 6 meters (about 20 feet) tall. The taller promontory beyond that is about 100 meters (about 325 feet) away, and the vista beyond that extends away for more than 400 meters (about 1300 feet) into the distance. This is an enhanced false color rendering of images taken by the panoramic camera (Pancam) on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity during the rover's 952nd sol, or Martian day, (Sept. 28, 2006) using the camera's 750-nanometer, 530-nanometer and 430-nanometer filters.

3)
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity reached the rim of "Victoria Crater" on Sept. 27, 2006, during the 951st Martian day, or sol, of the rover's work in the Meridian Planum region of Mars. Opportunity drove 9.28 kilometers (5.77 miles) in the explorations that took it from "Eagle Crater," where it landed in January 2004, eastward to "Endurance Crater," which it investigated for about half of 2004, then southward to Victoria.
This map of Opportunity's trek so far is overlaid onto images taken by the Mars Orbiter Camera on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor. Victoria is about 800 meters (one-half mile) in diameter, or about five times wider than Endurance and 40 times wider than Eagle. The scale bar at lower right shows the length of 800 meters (0.50 mile). North is up.
The Martian sol dates in the annotated image are as follows:

sol 58 was March 24, 2004
sol 315 was December 12, 2004
sol 446 was April 26, 2005
sol 654 was November 25, 2005
sol 833 was May 28, 2006
sol 898 was August 3, 2006
sol 952 was September 28, 2006