Mystery Upside-Down Rock Appears A Few Feet In Front of Mars Rover -- (Hm...Interesting...the Investigation begins... I think...) After a decade of exploring the Martian surface, the scientists overseeing veteran rover Opportunity thought they’d seen it all. That was until a rock mysteriously “appeared” a few feet in front of the six wheeled rover a few days ago. In a comparison of recent photographs captured by the rover’s panoramic camera, or Pancam, on sol 3528 of the mission, only bare bedrock can be seen. But on sol 3540, a fist-sized rock had appeared (raw Pancam images can be found in the mission archive). MER scientists promptly nicknamed the object “Pinnacle Island.” “It’s about the size of a jelly doughnut,” Squyres told Discovery News. “It was a total surprise, we were like ‘wait a second, that wasn’t there before, it can’t be right. Oh my god! It wasn’t there before!’ We were absolutely startled.” news.discovery/space/mystery-rock-appears-in-front-of-mars-rover-140117.htm?SSFEAT=1400DNEWSOGRecs-1367966217880&SREF=CustomerSite&SFBState=Unknown
Posted on: Wed, 25 Jun 2014 23:45:15 +0000
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