NASA’s Mars rover stuck in massive deadly dust storm

The Red Planet has been engulfed by a giant dust storm, bigger than our entire North American continent and has forced NASA to suspend its operations.

NASA recently declared about suspensions of science operations for its Opportunity rover in the wake of the massive dust storm on Mars. NASA is waiting for the storm to blow over before it could resume its operations.

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) captured a global map in which it demonstrated the huge growing dust storm and a blue dot signifying the rover’s accurate location. The storm was first noticed building on June 1. The MRO team instantly warned the Opportunity rover for the impact, but within days the storm grew so quickly to cover 18 million sq km, reported CNET.

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The storm is so bad that it is blotting out the sun and thus, affecting the rover’s solar panels used to recharge its batteries and power heaters that permit the rover to work in Mars’ extreme cold weather conditions. NASA described that the dust storm’s effect is ‘comparable to an extremely smoggy day that blots out sunlight’.

As per The Verge, the storm is so dusty that it has turned Mars’ skies so dark and making daytime turn into night, leading to the rover generating the lowest power amount ever. If this continues, Opportunity rover might not be able to communicate with engineers on Earth throughout the storm.

Though NASA is trying to combat the storm by stopping all the science activities and turning off most of the rover’s instruments, they still expect it to last for a while. Because of its growing size, it might even last a week, spanning almost the entire Mars globe ultimately.

“There is a risk to the rover if the storm persists for too long and Opportunity gets too cold while waiting for the skies to clear,” according to NASA. The storm has also led to the team of Mars’ Curiosity rover to track the storm before it turns to being a global one.