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Test Setup for Effort to Free Spirit
07.01.09
 
Sandbox setup to test and assess possible moves for getting Mars rover Spirit out of a patch of loose Martian soil.

With a slope of about 10 degrees and a pointy rock under the test rover's belly, this sandbox setup at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., is ready for engineers to use the test rover to assess possible moves for getting Mars rover Spirit out of a patch of loose Martian soil. The rock beneath the test rover was put in place on July 1, 2009, to resemble a rock underneath Spirit on Mars.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

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