The Legacy of Rover Opportunity: An Artificial Hero

The achievements of the oldest Mars explorer in history have given a privileged place in the Robot Hall of Fame. Now, NASA terminates the mission after 8 months without an answer. We review their successes, records and challenges on the red planet.

The exploration of distant territories is one of the most powerful ambitions of the human being from its origins. Explored the Earth, the technological development allowed in the XX century feats like the space exploration and the study of other distant bodies. Even, the possibility of man putting his own feet on them.

And if the human being has more and more exact and detailed knowledge about its closest planetary neighbor, Mars , thanks to the artifacts such as NASA’s Rover Opportunity. His career makes it one of the most important artificial ingenuities of all time, which will make him occupy a privileged position in the hall of fame of robots .

The Rover Opportunity remained active for almost 15 years exploring Mars relentlessly, greatly exceeding its life expectancy with its twin Spirit, since the mission was designed to last only 90 days; among many of the successes achieved by the robot.

Opportunity’s analyzes were key to elucidating that the red planet was, in fact, a warm and humid place, with the appropriate conditions for the maintenance of life, as we know it. And an essential condition for this is the presence of liquid water .

In addition, he set a one-day driving record on Mars. It sent more than 200,000 images to the Earth , exposed the surfaces of 52 rocks to reveal new mineral surfaces for analysis and discovered strong evidence in the  Endeavor crater of the action of ancient waters, similar to the drinking water of a pond or lake in the earth. 

Perseverated until the end

After overcoming many adversities, in 2018 it was knocked down by a strong sandstorm  that blocked sunlight and left Opportunity without power. After months of waiting, NASA finally announced in February 2019 that it was giving the robot as lost.

His final adventure took place in the western extremity of Perseverance Valley (Valley of Perseverance). There can be no more appropriate name for the end of this metal hero, which is a symbol of one of history’s greatest exploration achievements, which was a pioneer in the study of other worlds, which was able to overcome all kinds of adversities in the hostile Martian soil, and that has allowed humanity to have key clues about the red planet , to better prepare and in more efficient ways the future rovers explorers that arrive to Mars.

Although its loss is irreparable (not only for its technological and scientific value, but as a symbol of human progress), its legacy is now present in other Martian exploration artifacts, such as NASA’s InSight , which landed on November 26 of 2018.