Not aliens... yet.

Today NASA announced that they've found organic matter under an ancient lake bed on Mars, a strong indicator that the red planet was once home to life. Not bad for a 6yr old little* robot.

That is awesome!

Bloopy deep boop!

I think this picture went a little closer to Pixar's Wall E. than I initially intended, but I guess its unavoidable when dealing with a wheeled worker bot on a barren orange planet.

Curiosity's sister older sister, Opportunity, has been scouring the red planet for 14 years!

With further unmanned expeditions to Mars already in production, it looks like these two bots will have a little sister arriving soon, and it will continue to be a world populated only by robots until Elon Musk and his cronies invade in 2022.

We're slowly but surely colonising our neighbouring planet. 

'Baby steps Ellie, baby steps.'

*Surprisingly huge. Curiosity is 2.9M long, 2.7M wide and 2.2 meters high. I've lived in smaller rooms!

Dead Red

Well played ESA. You may not have had 100% success, but we're still one more step ahead and valuable lessons can be learn for the next ride.

And in the meantime, TGO can continue sciencing as it hangs above the red planet. Alone.

Snif :-(

Well, here we are.

With the fresh theories of Martian Panspermia, I guess today would be an appropriate time for me to post this follow up to my Steps, leaps and bounds image.

I recently re-read Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars. It being a fairly weighty book, I spent several weeks engrossed in and thereby inspired by our ongoing desire to visit our closest neighbour.

Its looking more and more likely that a private initiative will put someone on Mars within the next 25 years but in the meantime I have to get my space travel fix by following the astronauts currently orbiting our speck of dust, who are constantly working towards goals like this.

Three cheers for people in space!

Hip hip...