Posted on 07/18/2010 12:45:23 PM PDT by Berlin_Freeper
Either some little Martians came by and gave the Opportunity rover a quick once-over cleaning, or a recent gust of wind blew layers of dust off her solar panels. The image above (supplied by our favorite photo- whiz Stu Atkinson), shows Oppy's solar panels on sol 2274 and 2299 (approximately June 18 and July 12 here on Earth) with a marked difference in the amount of dust on the panels. Yesterday, the Twitter account for the rovers, @marsrovers Tweeted: "Love those Martian dust busters! A recent wind gust cleaned Oppy’s solar panels giving her a little power boost for the road." And on the road she is, heading earnestly for Endeavour Crater, with several recent drives of around 70 meters (230 feet) per sol. But she now some new autonomous software the rover team is trying out, and with her new greater power capacity, she should be able to keep on truckin'. Mars rover driver Scott Maxwell reported on Twitter this week that Opportunity is 40% of the way from Victoria Crater to Endeavour.
(Excerpt) Read more at universetoday.com ...
You go, grrl!
Considering that the atmosphere on the surface of Mars is like ours at 100,000 feet I’m amazed that this is happening.
What is all that white stuff.
cool
I live in a particularly dusty and windy place and have yet to ever see a gust blow off dust — it will deposit more. Including on my solar panels.
I bet it’s LGMs at work!
Maybe the messiah deemed it clean.
Maybe something happened to the camera or the lighting to change the appearance of the panels in different pictures.
Perhaps the next rovers we send should be equiped with solar panel blowers so we don’t have to depend on the fickle Martian wind.
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