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Mars Rover Breaks Free

Posted by Zonk on from the yay-NASA dept.

QuantumFTL writes "According to an MSNBC story Opportunity, the same rover that scored an interplanetary hole-in-one, has broken free of an interplanetary sand trap. The MER science operations mailing list was abuzz this morning with the news, as soon as the first rear hazcam image indicating success came down. Engineers were praised for working long nights and weekends to make this extrication possible. Good job, NASA!"

2 of 195 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Working Nights and Weekends by Sprotch · · Score: 5, Informative

    The rover is now long past its theoretical life span, any other part my fail, and that would be the end of it. One failure is hard to fix or work around, two is nearly impossible.

  2. Re:How they did it by Alien+Being · · Score: 5, Informative

    "To simulate martian gravity, which is a third of Earth's, experimenters stripped one of the test rovers of two-thirds of its weight"

    That would reduce intertia too, making the simulator easier to move than the one on Mars. I wonder if a better simulation would have been to attach a helium balloon to the CG of the vehicle.