NASA’s Opportunity rover completes 15 years on Mars

 

NASA’s Opportunity rover has completed 15 years of its touchdown on the surface of Mars. It has travelled 45 kilometers and logged its 5,000th Martian day back in February 2018. At present, the agency does not know the rover’s status.

The six-wheeler rover had landed in a region of Mars called Meridiani Planum on January 24, 2004. The solar-powered rover went silent since a global dust storm in June last year.

However, Opportunity’s mission continues, in a phase where mission engineers at NASA laboratories are sending commands to as well as listening for signals from the rover.