NASA’s Opportunity rover was supposed to last 90 days on Mars. Today is its 12th anniversary

[LiberalArkie]

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s greatest minds expected its two identical Mars Exploration Rovers to last 90?days before dust clouded their solar arrays and drained their power.

On Sunday, one of those NASA rovers, Opportunity, rolled into its 12th anniversary on Mars. It’s now a veteran of surviving the harsh Martian landscape that most believed would limit its lifespan to months, not years. Opportunity’s sibling, Spirit, landed weeks earlier and lasted six years.

“Twelve years is a very long time to have this sort of a continuous presence,” said Matt Golombek, Mars rovers project scientist. “For a science team to be this involved, on a daily basis, for this long on Mars, is pretty much unprecedented.”

The golf-cart sized solar-powered robot is showing its age. Its joints ache and lock, two of its scientific instruments no longer work, and it suffers bouts of amnesia caused by faulty flash memory.

Snip

http://www.sgvtribune.com/science/20160124/nasas-opportunity-rover-was-supposed-to-last-90-days-on-mars-today-is-its-12th-anniversary

[Android3.14]

1. It's been an awesome ride

What that ROV has seen will stay in the collective memory for a 1000 years.

[Orrex]

2. Another socialist failure

NASA is routinely beat up by RW anti-gub'mint loons, but what the agency has been able to accomplish on a shoestring budget is utterly amazing.

[Warren Stupidity]

3. This what happens when you let gummint do stuff.

The private sector could have made a robot that would have broken down when it was supposed to.

[Odin2005]

4. See, government doesn't work!

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. xkcd on Spirit and Opportunity: