Mars rover finally sees Martian dust devil

[n2doc]

by Denise Chow

updated 2 hours 49 minutes ago

After more than six years roaming the surface of Mars, NASA's Mars rover Opportunity has spotted its first dust devil on the Red Planet.

Unlike its robotic twin on Mars, Spirit — a prolific dust devil photographer — Opportunity's attempts to catch the tornado-like wind formations had repeatedly come up empty. That is, until now.

In a July 15 photo taken with its mast-mounted panoramic camera, Opportunity captured a tall column of swirling dust.

"This is the first dust devil seen by Opportunity," said Mark Lemmon of Texas A&M University, College Station, a member of the rover science team, in a statement.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38486510/ns/technology_and_science-space/

[benld74]

1. I believe THIS is what is causing the whirlwind,,,

[hobbit709]

2. That's a TASMANIAN Devil

On Mars, it was probably caused by this guy.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

3. I wonder how they feel about out trespass.

[jakeXT]

4. Opportunity had a cleaning event this month

On Sol 2298 (July 11, 2010), Opportunity's solar arrays experienced a dust-cleaning event. This boosted energy production to over 400 watt-hours (a 100-watt light bulb that burns for one hour uses 100 watt-hours of electricity). The previous week, solar array output was about 350 watt hours per day. With the extra energy from the Sol 2298 cleaning event, Opportunity was able to perform back-to-back drives on Sols 2299 and 2300 (July 12 and 14, 2010), each over 70 meters (230 feet).

As of Sol 2300 (July 14, 2010), solar array energy production has improved to 492 watt-hours, atmospheric opacity (Tau) was 0.223 and the solar array dust factor improved to 0.700.

http://marsrover.nasa.gov/mission/status_opportunityAll.html#sol2295

[tridim]

5. Every time I hear Opportunity's age my jaw drops.

What a machine!