Scientists worry about power on Spirit

The Mars rover Spirit is in a race against time to get into a safe location for the winter on Mars. A giant dust storm, preventing the rover from receiving any solar energy to power it. Rover operators only have a few weeks to get Spirit to a suitable location on the sunny side of a low north facing plateau before the amount of available sunlight becomes too depleted. Traveling is difficult because for everyday the rover travels it must then take a day to completely recharge. This means that the controllers on Earth have only seven different attempts to get the rover into a position where it can survive the harsh Martian winter. They are currently scrambling because the amount of sunlight decreases with each passing day. Following the huge dust storm, the ability of Spirit to collect solar energy has been significantly depleted and the machine is currently running at 42%. This is down from 50% that last winter and 70% the winter before.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/mars_rovers;_ylt=Aha1SOicTyZRjEWoYIxLib0pUKMB