Friday, November 20, 2009

Little Progress In Freeing A Rover On Mars

NASA's Mars Rover Spirit took this image with its front hazard-avoidance camera on May 6. Wheel slippage during attempts to extricate it from a patch of soft ground during the preceding two weeks had partially buried the wheels. NASA

From The New York Times:

The NASA rover Spirit, stuck in sand on Mars, tried to move Tuesday for the first time since May. In less than a second, it stopped.

Cautious mission managers had put tight constraints on the Spirit’s movement to ensure that it did not drive itself into a deeper predicament. Because the uncertainty in its tilt was more than one degree, the rover called it a day. Spirit awaits new instructions.

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