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Home Plate is the first rock structure of its kind to be found at the Spirit landing site - Courtesy NASA
The ongoing Mars Rover Spirit project continues success after success, months after its mandate

744 days after landing, the NASA Mars rover Spirit has reached a rough area of Mars called "Home Plate," which now has scientists rather puzzled.  The plateau is about six feet high and scientists believe it holds the key to help unlock the geologic clues to the planet's past.  Scientists now have a lot of work ahead of them because they now need to try and figure out what exactly Home Plate is.  Researchers know that it is made of layered rocks, but not much is known about them. 

The Spirit landed on Mars in January of 2004, and has been a target that NASA wanted to explore.  The Mars Exploration Rover missions were only supposed to last 90 days after the January 2004 touchdown.  Two years later, both rovers are alive and kicking -- funding for the mission has been extended again until September 2006. 

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RE: Mars "true" sky color?
By lobadobadingdong on 2/14/2006 1:32:21 PM , Rating: 2
Our sky is viewed as blue by the human eye because the high nitrogen content in the earths atmosphere diffuses the color blue ~10x's more than any other color.


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