Huge Dust Storm on Mars Hits NASA's Opportunity Rover

Space.com ^ | June 10, 2018 08:07am ET | By Tariq Malik,

[BenLurkin]

The Martian dust storm was first spotted from space by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, NASA officials said.

"As soon as the orbiter team saw how close the storm was to Opportunity, they notified the rover's team to begin preparing contingency plans," NASA officials said in a statement. "In a matter of days, the storm had ballooned."

As of Friday (June 8), the storm covers more than 7 million square miles of Mars (18 million square kilometers), according to NASA. That's an area larger than all of North America on Earth.

"Full dust storms like this one are not surprising, but are infrequent," NASA officials said in the statement. "They can crop up suddenly but last weeks, even months."

…

By Wednesday (June 6), Opportunity's power levels saw a major drop, forcing the rover to stop all science to conserve power. If the storm lasts too long, the main concern will be the Martian cold, a danger Opportunity has faced in the past, NASA officials said.

"There is a risk to the rover if the storm persists for too long and Opportunity gets too cold while waiting for the skies to clear," NASA wrote in the statement. Cold is thought to be what killed NASA's Spirit rover, Opportunity's twin, in 2010 after that robot got stuck in the Martian sand.

[BigEdLB]

You may want to consider, “To serve Men, Women, Inbetweens and DeNiro”, because the latter needs a particularly strong stomach, and the meat is tough and old...

[IronJack]

I think it’s amazing that the thin atmosphere on Mars would support such phenomena. The thermal differential necessary to drive such convection events must be enormous.

[bmwcyle]

The CGI guy is on summer vacation.

[Conan the Librarian]

Gonna make this years opposition of Mars hard on observers.

I’ve see the ‘Canali’ effect on Mars during a good opposition.

Was hoping to see it again this summer, but, it may not happen.

[Chances Are]

All is forgiven!

CA....