Mars rovers mark off five years of tireless servitude to humanity, boredom

NASA's Spirit rover landed on Mars on January 3rd, 2004, with Opportunity joining up 21 days later, and both are going strong five years later. Still no sign of Don Cheadle.

[KarlW @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:11PM]

Yea, well if you went on holiday and found Elvis, you wouldn't want to come home either.

Rock on, Rover!

[KarlW @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:17PM]

I want to add that I love that picture. It's doing the Wall-E thing like only a NASA-designed robotic planetary explorer can.

[shaun @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:38PM]

EEEEEEE----VVVVVV--AAAAA

[Blackstar @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:45PM]

WWWW AAAAAAAA LLLLLL EEEEEEEEE

[john @ Jan 3rd 2009 11:38PM]

i wonder what os it runs on?

[mirakutea @ Jan 4th 2009 5:20AM]

Next step: colonize mars :P..

[Mike @ Jan 4th 2009 8:35AM]

@John, I believe it runs on VXWorks. Not kidding. Just like linksys routers after they dumped linux.

[apple fanboy @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:11PM]

tax dollars to gud use

[conor @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:39PM]

That is one child left behind...

[conor @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:40PM]

UPDATE:
Oh, it is an apple fanboy, no wonder.

[KarlW @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:40PM]

Yea, for 5 years. On Mars. You've got to really hate that kid.

[BigD145 @ Jan 3rd 2009 9:09PM]

It's smarter than a 5th grader.

[i.c. weiner @ Jan 3rd 2009 9:11PM]

are YOU smarter than a 5th grader?

[Conor Kirkpatrick @ Jan 4th 2009 12:55AM]

omg change your name!

[Kris S. @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:19PM]

Hat's off to NASA and the rovers. Godspeed.

[Blackstar @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:52PM]

I know. Personally I think that is totally awesome. Longevity no one planned, and allowed us to see and learn things no human has ever before. What was once wild science fiction confined to the realm of imagination is now science fact for all the world to see. Makes you wonder what the next 10 or 20 or 100 years of scientific space exploration will bring. And these little guys helped start a whole new era in it.

R/C Cars on Mars. NASA, you rock.

[Mic2000 @ Jan 4th 2009 6:55AM]

Walllll-eeee....

[Smi @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:22PM]

It's quite cool and all, but this sort of exploration is an astronomical (no pun intended) waste of money. Sure, there is water, or rocks on Mars. Great. But it's too far away to do anything with - it's information on a usefulness scale as "Obama wore pink underpants yesterday"
All well and good, but not exactly something we can do anything useful with.

[ILoveApple @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:27PM]

Well, I've got a crush on Obama.

[Danny @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:29PM]

I am sure there is some positive application on Earth from the results of various experiments conducted in space. Sure, the obvious "living on Mars" dream may not become a reality for a very, very long time, but that is not to say that these rovers and the data collected is a complete waste. It is also a step in the direction of that dream, (as nerdy as that dream may be).

I don't think it's a waste of money.

[Spencer @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:32PM]

You are exactly right. We should have never started the space program. Who needs to know what else is out there?

This reminds me of that Christopher Columbus guy. What a loser. Why would anyone ever sail to the edge of the world? He was such a crazy guy with his crazy ideas of exploration and a new world.

[Patriks7 @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:34PM]

Oh no! Obama is gay?!
[/jk]

[KarlW @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:03PM]

It's like those computer things. They're good at cracking nazi encoding schemes, but how does that help me?

We may find dirt, we may find a bacteria with a gene for fighting cancer. It's entirely unpredictable. That's why we look - we don't know.

[radarskiy @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:30PM]

Imagine what you could have done with that $1.25 back!

[Mr. Pips @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:54PM]

I'd rather waste tax money on exploring Mars than on bailing out the UAW.

[binouz` @ Jan 3rd 2009 8:12PM]

Space exploration, and exploration in general, has to start somewhere as I don't think we're going to pull life on Mars out of our butts just like that. Look at the Moon landing, people were probably saying all the training and practice launches before that were useless and a waste of money, but it's thanks to them that we managed to get people on the moon and back safely.

[musback @ Jan 3rd 2009 9:59PM]

@ Smi

Trust me; Future Smi will be spinning in his grave if he ever realizes what kind of "frownable" remark he made.

I'm not even going to try and tell u what space exploration/investigation/sciences have given us in last years.

Let's not invest in space...? Because as we can see in Gaza right now: Religion has all the answers all along and will guide humanity through a peaceful and enlightening future!?

[loosely_coupled @ Jan 3rd 2009 11:29PM]

Yeah, five years of on-the-ground scientific research on Mar's planetary geology, climate, and atmosphere is completely worthless..
It's not like we are planning for a future manned mission to Mars that would benefit from this wealth of information...

[bjsguess @ Jan 4th 2009 1:10PM]

"We may find dirt, we may find a bacteria with a gene for fighting cancer. It's entirely unpredictable. That's why we look - we don't know."

Wait a second. We go from the POSSIBILITY that there MIGHT be bacteria on Mars to actually finding bacteria AND that bacteria carrying a gene for fighting cancer AND us actually testing the bacteria for the purposes of cancer trials? Wow.

While I fully acknowledge that the space program has made significant contributions to national defense and science I also believe that people are right to question whether money spent on Mars programs represents the highest and best use of our dollars.

[Jake @ Jan 5th 2009 12:29AM]

Perhaps you've never had a refreshing glass of Tang?

Tang, it's a kick in the glass.

-jp

[hala @ Jan 5th 2009 9:00AM]

That was what was said about the glue that became the adhesive for Post it notes, LASERS, who's sole use at one point was seeing how many razor blades they could burn through (laser power measured in Gillette's), the Transistor, the PC, and the list goes on.

Applied Research pays off big dividends in the long run, but you've got to find an application first. Instead of seeing it as a waste of money, look at it as an investment. Besides, the entire budget wouldn't feed the US Military for six months.

[Bleh @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:33PM]

I remember it landing 5 years ago =D

It was all over the news :o

[DT @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:38PM]

Wow, that's some memory you've got... 5 whole years, huh?

[nizzy1115 @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:33PM]

hey look its walee!

[Patriks7 @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:35PM]

At least try to get it correctly.. It's WALL·E..

[nizzy1115 @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:41PM]

obviously you understood what i was saying...isnt that whats more important than being so technical?

[1234321 @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:56PM]

no you fools its a WALL-M
Waste Allocation Load Lifter Mars-class

[kojo87 @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:56PM]

wait. it doesn't have tires?

[KarlW @ Jan 3rd 2009 6:59PM]

That's not a photo, you know.

They tried, but people kept blanking them when they asked them to hold the camera. Not going there again, that's for sure.

[kojo87 @ Jan 3rd 2009 8:53PM]

i was trying to make a bad pun on "tireless servitude"

[KAIKAI @ Jan 3rd 2009 9:09PM]

bad pun indeed...:P

[Hi Kenneth @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:10PM]

man...5 years already, I was in the 4th grade when this happened.

[feraligatr8 @ Jan 3rd 2009 9:06PM]

lol me 2, It's so easy 2 remember what grade u wer in in that year coz it goes 2001- class 1, 2006- class 6, 2004- class 4, now I'm gonna be in year 9, I remember when it was launched.

[Goatee Man @ Jan 3rd 2009 9:15PM]

Suddenly I feel very old.

[Trevor @ Jan 3rd 2009 9:24PM]

Wow. I though I was one of the younger Giz readers at 19. Damn. That explains a lot of things.

[Muhammad-Oli @ Jan 4th 2009 12:15AM]

Giz readers? Lol.

[loosely_coupled @ Jan 4th 2009 2:59PM]

9th grade??? Oh man you are hitting the geek early... You should be out with your friends getting drunk and harassing girls, not reading engadget! The highschool life only comes once...

[Samurai Jack @ Jan 3rd 2009 7:12PM]

Sure, they're little rovers now. But stranding them on Mars? Alone? Just wait... they'll seek out each other. Merge. Alter their programming. And then come home. Looking for their creators. Looking for US. To get their revenge! And William Shatner won't be around to save us.

[ProfessorKaos @ Jan 4th 2009 7:29PM]

Who needs William Shatner when we have an army of trashed Furby's to annoy the shit out of them?

[Mike O @ Jan 5th 2009 7:27AM]

Captain Kirk may not be there to save us, but Denny Crane will sue them for every penny they've got.