The Opportunity Rover's Final Photo of Mars (cnn.com) 48
pgmrdlm shares a report from CNN: Last May, Opportunity took a look around Perseverance Valley on the inner slope of Endurance Crater's western rim. The valley is about the length of two football fields and it's full of descending shallow troughs. Ironically, Perseverance Valley became Opportunity's final resting place when a planet-encircling dust storm took over Mars in June, blocking the sun from reaching the rover's solar panels. Engineers lost contact on June 10 and persistently sent more than a thousand signals and commands to the rover over eight months until they realized the mission was over on February 13. But before those dark days, Opportunity acted like a tourist, snapping 354 photos between May 13 and June 10 that would create one last beautiful panorama of the place it will forever call home. "This final panorama (embedded in the report) embodies what made our Opportunity rover such a remarkable mission of exploration and discovery," said Opportunity project manager John Callas of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "To the right of center you can see the rim of Endeavour Crater rising in the distance. Just to the left of that, rover tracks begin their descent from over the horizon and weave their way down to geologic features that our scientists wanted to examine up close. And to the far right and left are the bottom of Perseverance Valley and the floor of Endeavour crater, pristine and unexplored, waiting for visits from future explorers."
Re: (Score:1, Interesting)
No they aren't living there. They are taking short stays of typically 6 months. You know why? Because they would be dead if they tried living there for years. Space nutters ignore reality. And by the way, the ISS is paradise compared to Mars or another reachable planet.
Re: Now binary boy will be along to explain that g (Score:1)
What Mars does have that the ISS doesnâ(TM)t have (but that we should have some sort of test station for by now) is gravity. The main health problems that astronauts experience in the ISS are bone density loss and degradation of their vision. Both of these are results of the microgravity environment. On Mars, there would be gravity. What we simply donâ(TM)t know is if it would completely eliminate the health problems (high probability it would eliminate the pressure problems that damage eyesight,
dune buggy (Score:1)
Re: dune buggy (Score:1)
Just go over to the Hollywood set where the photos were taken, and you can!
XKCD captured this (Score:2)
The XKCD cartoon was for Spirit, but it captured this feeling for Rover as well.
https://xkcd.com/695/ [xkcd.com]
Re:XKCD captured this (Score:5, Funny)
The XKCD cartoon was for Spirit, but it captured this feeling for Rover as well.
https://xkcd.com/695/ [xkcd.com]
There is an XKCD cartoon for Opportunity as well:
https://xkcd.com/1504/ [xkcd.com]
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
Better resolution (Score:5, Informative)
It you want to see that last panorama photo in better resolution, try this link:
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.... [futurecdn.net]
This image is a cropped version of the last 360-degree panorama taken by the Opportunity rover's panoramic camera from May 13 through June 10, 2018. The view is presented in false color to make some differences between materials easier to see.
Re: (Score:1, Troll)
Notice how they photoshopped out the sky on those photos? That was to hide the studio lights.
Re: Better resolution (Score:1)
Itâ(TM)s a composite photo. The sky isnâ(TM)t photoshopped out. The rover has a limited data budget. Why would it waste data taking pictures of the sky and sending them back.
Re:Better resolution (Score:4, Informative)
Here is another source. The bottom panel is highly zoom-able.
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/j... [nasa.gov]
and from orbit [Re:Better resolution] (Score:1)
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/... [nasa.gov]
Don't link to fucking CNN you utter twat (Score:1)
Don't link to fucking CNN you utter twat. Link to the original source [nasa.gov].
Re: (Score:3)
NASA has always been a marketing agency that does some space and military related work.
And an earlier comment is correct - skip linking to junk news outlets like CNN and use the original source [nasa.gov]
Just wanted to say.. (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Gelsacs (Score:3)
Well, someone's gelsacs are safe from K'Breel's wrath now at any rate.