Spirit Dies?

[classicman]

After six highly successful years of exploring the red sands of Mars, NASA's rover Spirit will rove no more.

With its six wheels stuck in powdery sand and two wheels no longer working at all, the resilient little explorer will become an immobile scientific observatory -- if it can survive the harsh temperatures of the upcoming winter.

"Its driving days are likely over," Doug McCuistion, director of NASA's Mars Exploration Program, said in a telephone news conference Tuesday.

If Spirit can be awakened after what could be a six-month hibernation, researchers will use it to attempt to answer one of their most pressing questions: whether the planet has a solid iron core or a liquid one.

If the vehicle can't be revived, it will still have far surpassed scientists' original expectations and its design life of three months, traveling nearly 12 miles across the barren surface of Mars and finding strong evidence that water once altered the planet's terrain.

Spirit's twin, Opportunity, is still moving across the Martian surface farther north nearer the equator and on the other side of the planet, and continues to send back valuable data.

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Let us hope for what may be after the martian winter, revel in what was 24x its expected lifespan, and look forward to its twin Opportunity which was so aptly named.
No matter how one looks at this, it was and continues to be a HUGE success.