NASA team loses contact with Mars rover
Thursday, January 22, 2004 Posted: 1:17 PM EST (1817 GMT)
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 The Spirit rover reached for Martian soil for the first time January 16.
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PASADENA, California (CNN) -- NASA researchers said Thursday they were unable to make contact with the Mars rover "Spirit" and the source of the problem was unknown.
Spirit project manager Pete Theisinger told reporters there is a "very serious anomaly" in communicating with the robot and the last exchange of information scientists had with the craft was Wednesday morning. Researchers continued attempting to contact the six-wheeled rover and remained hopeful that the problem could be resolved.
Scientists initially thought a storm in Australia was keeping them from sending signals to instruct the Spirit rover to drill into a Mars rock. But on Thursday, the problem appeared to be more serious than a passing storm.
The six-wheeled Spirit has sent dozens of highly-detailed pictures of the red planet's landscape since landing in Gusev crater on January 3 for a mission that was expected to last around 90 days. While many sleep-deprived scientists are poring through the data from Spirit, others are making final preparations for its rover twin, Opportunity, to land just past midnight Saturday. Opportunity is heading for the other side of the planet.
Each of the rovers is equipped with eight cameras designed to snap panoramas of the Martian surface with resolutions so sharp they retain crisp detail when blown up to the size of a movie screen, according to NASA.
Their microscopes, spectrometers and drills could unlock geologic secrets from billions of years ago, when scientists think the planet might have had conditions more suitable for life.
