Opportunity Rover Arrives at Endeavour Crater, on Mars


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NASA's Mars rover Opportunity has finally arrived at the giant crater Endeavour, after nearly three years of intrepid driving across the surface of the Red Planet.

The golf cart-sized rover made landfall at its destination yesterday (Aug. 9) when it pulled up to a vista called Spirit Point on the rim of Endeavour crater, NASA officials announced today. Endeavour is a vast scar in Martian surface that is about 14 miles (22 kilometers) across.

The 7-year-old Opportunity has been aiming for Endeavour crater since mid-2008, when it left a smaller crater (called Victoria) after a two-year pit stop. The aging rover is expected to spend years at Endeavour, if it lasts that long, in order to study rocks at the site that have never been seen before.

At Endeavour crater, scientists are hoping to find much older rocks than those examined by Opportunity during its first seven years on the Red Planet.

The rocks there are older than any Mars terrain studied by Opportunity, and could provide a new glimpse into the planet's history and water story, Arvidson said.

Endeavour became a tantalizing destination after NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter detected clay minerals that may have formed in an early warmer and wetter period on the planet.

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thanks for posting this Hum, this is really good news, it has taken a while to get there! nice pics, always amazing to think this is from Mars. can't wait for Curiosity to get there!

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yeah they're slow, but the real marvel is the longevity on these rovers, they were designed to work for like a few months. Curiosity will be a lot faster and more impressive in technical terms. plus we'll be getting all that fancy 3D HD video.

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true, very wise words, i'll take this kind of progress over none any day of the week. of course i'd rather have more, but that's what we have for the moment! i'm really impressed with the rovers, they've proven so sturdy and hard working, it's amazing.

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you mean go to Spirit, right? i don't think so, they're too far apart. even Curiosity won't do that, she'll be in Gale crater which is kinda far away. guess it'll have to be the manned missions that collect all these robotic friends we've sent up there starting the 60's.

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not again Hum...well at least you're back to the old sig, i love it!

and we will have people on Mars by 2020 Simon, mark my words!

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