THE RED PLANET — NASA lost contact with their Mars-based Opportunity robot this week after a massive dust storm set about its position on Mars.
That storm has, according to the space agency, made it almost completely dark, making it hard for the solar powered machine to operate. Curiosity, NASA's other Martian rover, is nuclear powered and not reliant on the sun.
The space agency believes that the robot has entered low power mode where only a mission clock remains active. NASA reckons the large amounts of dust it has encountered will stop it from charging for some time.
The dust storm, active since May 30, covers some 14 million square miles of Mars. For comparison, that's more than double the size of Russia — Earth's largest country.
