NASA’s Spirit Rover Completes Mission on Mars

If by “completes mission” you mean “makes us all sad by dying,” well, okay. It is not scientific or logical that I am sad because a cool little robot is dead on another planet, but it is human. This press release from NASA suggests that PR professionals are also apparently living on another planet, where the only use of language is to construct a reality distortion field to prevent anyone from seeing this announcement as a bummer.

“What’s most remarkable to me about Spirit’s mission is just how extensive her accomplishments became,” said Squyres. “What we initially conceived as a fairly simple geologic experiment on Mars ultimately turned into humanity’s first real overland expedition across another planet. Spirit explored just as we would have, seeing a distant hill, climbing it, and showing us the vista from the summit. And she did it in a way that allowed everyone on Earth to be part of the adventure.” —NASA – NASA’s Spirit Rover Completes Mission on Mars.

I told my wife, “NASA’s Spirit is dead,” which was perhaps a little blunt.