Friday, March 11, 2005

Dust Devils - Spirit Sol 421

One thing I might do with this blog, between Midnight Mars Browser software updates, is note some of the landmarks that we pass along the way with the Mars Rover missions (really more because it's fun that anything else). There is a heck of a landmark today: as noted on the mer.rlproject.com forums, Spirit caught at least one dust devil on camera on Sol 421! And not only that, but it appears that another dust devil (or possibly one of the same?) was good enough to come by and clean off Spirit's dusty solar panels, so we are now back to almost full power! This is a fanstastic development for Spirit... let's hope the skies stay clear now and those power levels stay up. You can see the dust devils for yourself in Midnight Mars Browser on Spirit Sol 421, or follow the image links from the mer.rlproject.com discussion.