NASA’s Curiosity Rover Suffers Wheel Damage After 12 Years of Martian Exploration: Latest Images and Insights

MerahPutih.com – A NASA robot that was hunting for signs of alien life on Mars is now damaged. This was revealed through new images released by NASA.

The robot named Curiosity has been busy collecting rocks for more than 12 years to find out if the Red Planet is capable of supporting life.

Curiosity has also been exploring Gale Crater since 2012 and covered a distance of over 20 miles. However, this long journey has taken its toll on the device, having survived several dust storms and the challenging Martian terrain.

Images released by NASA show that Curiosity’s wheels were badly damaged. They show very noticeable gap holes in the aluminum wheels.

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Curiosity itself has six wheels. Fortunately, NASA doesn’t seem too worried about the damage.

According to NASA’s Mission Operations Engineer, Ashley Stroupe, the US $ 2.5 billion (Rp. 38 trillion) device “is still holding up well despite receiving some of the worst damage on Mars. “

Holes and tears became more numerous during Curiosity’s first year on the Red Planet. Since then, the experts who control the bot have tried to avoid bad environments to avoid more holes. They have also released a special update to change the speed.

“Wheel wear has been a concern, and while we expect the wheels to have many years of service life, we want to reduce that wear whenever possible to extend the life of the wheels, ” said part of the NASA experiment. team, Art Rankin, quoted from The SunTuesday (1/10).

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During its time on Mars, Curiosity has discovered a series of mysterious objects. The space agency recently revealed that they found a yellow crystal that “wasn’t supposed to be there.”

Curiosity certainly defied all odds, well beyond the two year mission period originally given. At the moment, the bot is not alone on Mars, because there is persistence that is also doing research on the surface.

NASA made thicker and more durable wheels for Endurance to avoid damage like what happened to Curiosity. Perseverance, which is the size of a car, has been on Mars since February 18, 2021. (soft)