Triumph of the Robots

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The American robots, Spirit and Opportunity, have completed a year of discovery on Mars. This mission has been a great success for NASA and JPL.

Mars Rovers Are Still Going

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43455-2005Jan2.html
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/spirit_oneyr_050103.html

One Mars rover has a touch of arthritis in one wheel, and the other spent six months in a crater and almost got stuck, but NASA's historic exploration mission completed a year of discovery today with both Spirit and Opportunity in excellent health.
One year after it bounced to a halt on Mars's Gusev Crater, the rover Spirit is perched in the "Columbia Hills" more than 400 feet above its landing site examining a rock dubbed "Wishstone."
Half a planet away, Opportunity is motoring along the Meridiani Planum, having escaped Endurance Crater after six months of explorations. It is embarked on a 220-yard journey to visit the heat shield that protected it when it landed Jan. 23.
The two rovers were designed to explore for 90 days. They have survived a Martian winter, lasted four times as long as expected and show no signs of slowing down.
After only six weeks on the job, Opportunity found compelling evidence that liquid water once soaked at least part of Mars.
Spirit's closest brush with catastrophe came when software problems caused the rover's computers to cramp up for the first three weeks of the mission. Today Spirit's chief difficulty is a right front wheel that draws too much electricity, a problem that can be eased by traveling backward.
Opportunity was deliberately driven into Endurance Crater in the belief that the science benefits far outweighed the risk of getting stuck in the sand. But after the rover finished its work, its handlers found a way out.