Mystery of Mars rover's 'carwash' rolls on

[Syrinx]

NASA's Mars rover Opportunity seems to have stumbled into something akin to a carwash that has left its solar panels much cleaner than those of its twin rover, Spirit. A Martian carwash would account for a series of unexpected boosts in the electrical power produced by Opportunity's solar panels.

The rovers landed on Mars in January 2004 with solar cells capable of providing more than 900 watt-hours of electricity per day. Spirit's output has dropped to about 400 watt-hours, partly because Martian dust has caked its solar panels.

Opportunity's output also declined at first - to around 500 watt-hours - but over the past six months it has regained power (New Scientist print edition, 30 October). Lately, its solar cells have been delivering just over 900 watt-hours.

Rover team leader Jim Erickson at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, told New Scientist that a process still not understood has repeatedly removed dust from the solar panels. "These exciting and unexplained cleaning events have kept Opportunity in really great shape," he says.

*snip*

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn6824

[RoeBear]

1. These guys are everywhere

[BlueJazz]

2. LOL!...Funny!

[librechik]

3. maybe it's close to the only car wash on Mars

http://www.marsanomalyresearch.com/evidence-reports/2001/029/huge_nozzle.htm

[Thor_MN]

4. The little green guy with the spray bottle and rag is pissed that we

haven't tipped yet. They better start watching the hubcaps...

[ET Awful]

5. Hmmm, I wonder if I could get an exciting and unexplained cleaning event

at my apartment?

It would save me a lot of time and effort :)

on edit . . . why am I getting disco flashbacks:

Come summer the work gets kind a hard
This ain't no place to be if ya planned on being a star.
Let me tell you it's always cool
And the boss don't mind sometimes if ya act a fool.

At the car wash
Talkin' about the car wash yeah!
Come on and sing it for me car wash.
Car wash yeah!