Mars Rover Finds Rock Like Meteorites on Earth
From Times Staff and Wire Reports
NASA’s Opportunity rover has found an unusual rock at its Meridiani Planum landing site that is unlike any others seen by previous Mars expeditions, researchers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena said Wednesday.
But the rock is virtually identical in composition to two meteorites discovered on Earth that were thought to have come from Mars. One is the Shergotty meteorite that fell in India in 1865; the second was discovered in Antarctica in 1979.
The meteorites were probably blasted from the Martian surface by the impact of an asteroid. The rock discovered by Opportunity is unlike any others around it, and may have been ejected by the same impact before falling back to the Martian surface.
