Opportunity's Second Martian Birthday at Cape Verde

Space & Earth science / Space Exploration

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell

A promontory nicknamed "Cape Verde" can be seen jutting out from the walls of Victoria Crater in this approximate true-color picture taken by the panoramic camera on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity.

The rover took this picture on martian day, or sol, 1329 (Oct. 20, 2007), more than a month after it began descending down the crater walls – and just 9 sols shy of its second Martian birthday on sol 1338 (Oct. 29, 2007).

Opportunity landed on the Red Planet on Jan. 25, 2004. That's nearly four years ago on Earth, but only two on Mars because Mars takes longer to travel around the sun than Earth. One Martian year equals 687 Earth days.

The overall soft quality of the image, and the "haze" seen in the lower right portion, are the result of scattered light from dust on the front sapphire window of the rover's camera.

This view was taken using three panoramic-camera filters, admitting light with wavelengths centered at 750 nanometers (near infrared), 530 nanometers (green) and 430 nanometers (violet).

Source: NASA

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Posted by weewilly 10/30/07 20:42

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These two robotic rovers have really done a magnificent job and they were only designed and expected to last for six months. Great job to those that had anything to do with its design, analysis and the building of it. Well done.