The infamous NASA Mars Opportunity Rover marked its 11th year on Mars yesterday and the rover’s mission team are celebrating it with a beautiful landscape panoramic of the red planet.
The Opportunity rover landed on Mars on the 24th of Jan in 2004 as a part of mission that sent 2 rovers to Mars. Its twin named the spirit was the first to land on Mars and the Opportunity followed two weeks later. Their purpose was to look for signs of water and life on the red planet, both rovers did a stellar job of finding and transmitting back evidence to its earth base.
In early 2010 the spirit had finally given way to wear and tear and declared dead a year after in 2011 but Opportunity powered on and is still going strong. The rover is now exploring the rim of the Endeavor crater since August 2011 which is a 22 kilometer wide crater. The rover recently climbed up on the top most area of the rim known as Cape Tribulation earlier this month.
Full resolution picture courtesy of NASA, click on the above to view it in full.