ROVERS COULD TRAVERSE MARS ALL SUMMER
BYLINE: Mike Lafferty, THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 03A
The Mars rovers are in prime condition and could operate through the summer, NASA officials said yesterday as they announced the strongest hints yet that water and life may have existed on the Red Planet.
"This mission has already met our wildest expectations," said Ed Weiler, associate administrator for the Office of Space Science. He added that the twin rovers, Opportunity and Spirit, might be kept alive until September.
Their mission, which began in January, was for 90 days.
At a news briefing yesterday, scientists said they think rocks at the Opportunity landing site likely formed on the shoreline of a salty sea.
While they didn't come out and say the L-word, they said that a sea and its sediments are the strongest evidence yet that dusty Mars might once have been suitable for life.
The news that the rovers' missions could be extended is good for Rongxing Li, an Ohio State University mapping expert on the Mars science team.
"That means they're going to fund it," he said. "Both are so healthy it would be a shame not to use them."
The rovers, which landed about three weeks apart on opposite sides of the planet, are performing flawlessly, although power generation from the solar panels has dropped as Mars moves into autumn, according to Geoff Landis of the space agency's Glenn Research Center, near Cleveland.
"Dust is accumulating on the panels, but not as much as we thought," said Landis, also a member of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's rover science team.
Extending the missions could more than double the distance the rovers cover.
Identifying past or current life likely will be up to future missions, such as a planned landing of a nuclear-powered, minivan-size rolling laboratory in 2009.
"I'd like to say if you have an interest in searching for fossils on Mars, this is the first place you'd want to go," Weiler said of the Opportunity site.
Then again, he added, it might take a human scientist to look under the right rock or in the right cave.
mlafferty@dispatch.com
GRAPHIC: Photo, NASA/, Scientists say the texture of this rock shows Mars once had a salty sea --, strong evidence that the planet could have sustained life.
LOAD-DATE: March 24, 2004
Copyright 2004 The Columbus Dispatch