Showing posts with label planets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label planets. Show all posts

Monday, January 10, 2011

Rovers entering 8th year exploring the surface of Mars

The 2 rovers that were supposed to spend 90 days exploring the surface of Mars are having an anniversary.

Spirit landed on Mars at 04:35 Ground UTC on January 4, 2004. It is now stuck in the sand and no longer able to move. Assuming it wakes up from its winter hibernation soon, it will continue to send back data from a fixed location on the surface. More about Spirit at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_rover.

Opportunity landed on January 25, 2004 05:05 Ground UTC. It is still mobile and actively exploring a football-field-size crater called "Santa Maria." More info at http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/MRO/news/mro20110104.html

Perhaps Chabot should have a party to celebrate?

Kepler finds first rocky exoplanet

Press release from NASA

Kepler_Rocky_Planet

Saturn Eclipses the Sun?

In the Shadow of Saturn


Something you will never see from Earth, Saturn coming between you and the sun.

This used to be up on the wall in the Solar-Go-Round room at Chabot Space and Science Center, but when Bill Nye moved it, the picture seems to have gone away.

For me, the coolest thing about this picture is that you can see Earth as a tiny dot between the bright and fuzzy rings to the left of the planet.