West Rim of Endeavour Crater
After many years of slowly riding along, Opportunity, NASA’s robot which is well-beyond its estimated life span, has finally reached a crater on Mars called Endeavour. It’s triumphant enough that Opportunity remains operational as it has been in continued operation for seven years. That it has reached Endeavour is even that much more satisfying for scientists.
Opportunity arrives on the scene at Endeavour after trucking along the Martian landscape for 12 miles after spending some quality time within the Victoria crater.
NASA is quick to point out that the Endeavour crater is more significant than the Victoria crater for a number of reasons. Firstly, the sheer size of Endeavour is 25 times the size of Victoria and its diameter is 14 miles, too. Secondly, Opportunity provides NASA a chance of getting to examine older rocks within Endeavour than what was seen at Victoria.
“We’re soon going to get the opportunity to sample a rock type the rovers haven’t seen yet,” said Matthew Golombek, Mars Exploration Rover science team member, at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif. “Clay minerals form in wet conditions so we may learn about a potentially habitable environment that appears to have been very different from those responsible for the rocks comprising the plains.”
The design team which built Opportunity has to be proud of themselves, their roving robot continues to complete multiple missions beyond the scope of its original parameters. Opportunity’s sister rover, named Spirit, ceased communicating with home base on March, 2010.
“Our arrival at this destination is a reminder that these rovers have continued far beyond the original three-month mission,” said John Callas, Mars Exploration Rover project manager at JPL.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell/ASU