Pasadena, Calif. (UPI) Dec 8, 2009 - NASA engineers attempting to free the Mars rover Spirit from loose Martian sand since April say the results of their attempts so far are not encouraging.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Dec 08, 2009 - Opportunity Status for sol 2076-2079: Opportunity has been investigating the rock known as Marquette Island. On Sol 2076 (Nov. 25, 2009), the robotic arm (IDD) placed the Moessbauer (MB) spectrometer on a rock target called Islington Bay for a long, multi-sol integration.
Huntsville AL (SPX) Dec 04, 2009 - Homer's Iliad tells the story of Troy, a city besieged by the Greeks in the Trojan War. Today, a lone robot sits besieged in the sands of Troy while engineers and scientists plot its escape.
- Spirit Status for sol 2096-2099: Spirit's extrication from her embedded location at Troy on the west side of Home Plate has been complicated by a recurring stall condition with the right rear wheel.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Dec 03, 2009 - NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter put itself into a safe standby mode on Saturday, Nov. 28, and the team operating the spacecraft has begun implementing careful steps designed to resume Odyssey's science and relay operations within about a week.
Houston TX (SPX) Dec 03, 2009 - Using more advanced analytical instruments now available, a Johnson Space Center research team has reexamined the 1996 finding that a meteorite contains strong evidence that life may have existed on ancient Mars.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Dec 01, 2009 - Opportunity has been investigating the rock known as Marquette Island over the last couple of weeks. This target is proving to be something unique that Opportunity has not encountered in more than 2000 Sols of exploring Mars.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2009 - This image from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows a sample of the variety and complexity of processes that may occur on the walls of Martian craters, well after the impact crater formed.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2009 - The team operating NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter plans to uplink protective files to the spacecraft next week as one step toward resuming the orbiter's research and relay activities.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2009 - On Sol 2095 (Tuesday, Nov. 24), Spirit performed a set of diagnostic actions related to a stall of the right-rear wheel on the previous drive, three days earlier. The diagnostics showed a fully functioning wheel free of obstruction. The rover was commanded forward with 1.5 meters (4.9 feet) of wheel spin.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 24, 2009 - Spirit experienced a wheel stall with the right-rear wheel during the second step of a two-step drive on Sol 2092 (Saturday, Nov. 21).
Washington (AFP) Nov 23, 2009 - A network of valleys discovered on Mars show that the red planet was likely once covered by a vast ocean that fed a humid, rainy climate, according to research published Monday.
Washington (AFP) Nov 23, 2009 - A new detailed map of Mars shows what was likely a vast ocean in the north and valleys around the equator, suggesting that the planet once had a humid, rainy climate, according to research published Monday.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 19, 2009 - NASA and Microsoft Corp. of Redmond, Wash., have collaborated to create a Web site where Internet users can have fun while advancing their knowledge of Mars.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 18, 2009 - Impact craters on Mars are kind of neat. Many of them look very different than impact craters seen on Earth's moon or Mercury. Fresh lunar and Mercurian craters have ejecta blankets that look a bit rough near the crater rims; around larger craters, long rays or chains of secondary craters radiate away from the crater rims.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 18, 2009 - Driving commands are being prepared to instruct Spirit to attempt to drive forward. These are the first driving commands since Spirit became embedded in a Martian sandtrap approximately six months ago. These commands will be transmitted to Spirit at 1 a.m. PST (4 a.m. EST) Tuesday, Nov. 17.
