This has proven to be a bad week for NASA rovers patrolling
Mars. NASA has several rovers on the surface of Mars performing
various missions including looking for water and existence of
ice on the red planet. Yesterday, NASA announced that it had
lost communications with the Phoenix lander and had no
expectations of the lander surviving the inhospitable Martian
winter. Despite the fact that the rover has been declared dead
by NASA, the Phoenix mission was a success and lasted longer
than originally planned by NASA. Today, NASA has announced that
the Spirit rover is also in jeopardy of failing. Lack of
sunlight hitting the solar panels of Spirit is causing serious
concern at NASA. According to scientists on the mission, Spirit
only produced 89 watt-hours of energy last weekend, which is
half the amount of power the rover needs for full performance.
The reason for the drop in power production is a massive dust
storm that deposited Martian dust on the solar panels and
prevented sunlight form reaching them. Spiri