Opportunity Rover has reunited in Martian atmosphere

Universe today summarizes the Opportunity rover. NASA's Opportunity Rover has reunited itself with the heat shield that protected its entry into the Martian atmosphere almost a year ago, when it first arrived at Mars. After it was ejected, the shield crashed to the surface nearly 2 km away from Opportunity's landing spot.

NASA release says that after six fruitful months exploring the interior of "Endurance Crater," the Opportunity rover has successfully climbed out of the crater onto the surrounding flatland of Meridiani Planum.

Once out, the rover examined some of its own tracks that it had laid down prior to entering the crater. It compared them side-by-side with fresh tracks in order to observe any weathering effects in the intervening 200 sols.

Opportunity is now making its way toward an engineering examination of its heat shield, which is located about 200 meters (220 yards) from the edge of Endurance.

Now that the vehicle is on the relatively flat plain rather than tilted toward the Sun on the north-facing inner slope of the crater, electrical output from its solar array has declined by about 15 percent. Opportunity remains in excellent health as it begins a new phase of exploration.