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back to article Curiosity spins its wheels and shoots up the Martian landscape

The driving team at NASA has taken Curiosity out for its first spin around the landing site ahead of its first road trip, as well as shooting up the area with a laser to get the initial readings about what exactly it is trundling across. On Wednesday, Curiosity advanced 15 feet (4.5m) to give a full rollover of the drive …

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  1. Mike Flugennock
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    cool pan shot...

    ...and it looks like the first thing Curiosity did was to spin a doughnut. Awriiiigghhht.

    Get'cher motor runnin' (daaahhhhh dah dah dah!)

    Head out on the highway (daaahhhhh dah dah dah!)

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    1. ratfox
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      Go

      Well, it has atomic batteries, doesn't it?

      - Atomic batteries to power. Turbines to speed.

      - Roger. Ready to move out.

      Na na na na na na na na na na na na na, Batmaaaan, na na na na na na…

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    2. Anonymous Coward
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      Pint

      Re: cool pan shot...

      Americans, how far have you travelled just to do doughnuts? To another planet!

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  2. MIc
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    holy ballz brontosaurus is big

    that is all

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  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Eh? What's teh point?

    If it's that slow, the brontosaurus will merely saunter away when it sees it coming. It's never going to catch one.

    Unless, that is, they're going to laser a really big hole a few yards in front of the brontosaurus just before he gets there. Can't wait for that!

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  5. Anonymous Coward
    Pint

    Morse for JPL?

    How about morse for everyone involved on one side and Fahrenheit 451 on the other as it makes its trek across The Red Planet.

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  6. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    100 meters is less than a full brontosaurus?

    Exactly how big is the Reg unit brontosaurus, and why is it so much longer than an actual brontosaurus? I don't think the real ones were even 100 feet, let alone larger than that in meters.

    Though it would be cool being up in the stands this fall and imagining a dinosaur that stretched from goalpost to goalpost on an American football field! (that's ~110 meters, for you non USians)

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    1. Martin Budden Silver badge
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      Facepalm

      Re: 100 meters is less than a full brontosaurus?

      One Reg brontosaurus is 138.2851 metres, and yes that does seem optimistic! 20 metres would be about right. I think there may be a problem with the Reg online standards converter.

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      1. yakitoo
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        Facepalm

        Re: 100 meters is less than a full brontosaurus?

        I notice that we don't seem to have an El reg unit for time.

        A serious oversight IMHO

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        1. Tom7
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          Re: 100 meters is less than a full brontosaurus?

          Something I've moaned about before. Time is a derived unit, linguine per percentage of the maximum speed of a sheep in a vacuum. This gives one linguine per percentage of the maximum speed of a sheep in a vacuum equal to approximately 4.66 microseconds. I have christened this unit the Cowell, being the same time it takes the fearless reality TV judge to reduce an aspiring starlet to tears.

          But nobody listens to me...

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  7. Sceptic Tank Silver badge
    Go

    Worse than a backseat driver is...

    ...a driving team.

    Can you imagine?

    "You're driving too fast!"

    "Look out for that hole!"

    "You missed the exit!"

    "Keep your following distance. You're going to hit that Opportunity rover in front of you"

    "There's a police martian hiding behind that hovercraft".

    etc.

    All the usual stuff, but this time from a committee.

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  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Interesting spectrographic output...

    I wonder what's behind the relatively high proportion of calcium in that rock sample?

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    1. Michael H.F. Wilkinson Silver badge
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      Re: Interesting spectrographic output...

      Calcium is a relatively common element in space (as are most even elements before iron).

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  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    0.6 of a Brontosaurus?

    Is that and African or a European Brontosaurus?

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    1. Michael H.F. Wilkinson Silver badge
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      Coat

      Re: African or a European Brontosaurus?

      And do they migrate?

      Mine is the one with the Holy Grail DVD in the pocket

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  10. Liam Proven Silver badge
    FAIL

    Bradbury died last *year*?

    No he didn't. He died last June, this year.

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    1. yakitoo
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      Coat

      Re: Bradbury died last *year*?

      Would that be Terra or Martian years?

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  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    When I saw this picture, I thought they had done the irresponsible thing of drawing a smiley face on a Martian rock:

    http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA16091.jpg

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  12. Elmer Phud
    Coat

    Marks out of ten

    "No skid marks"

    But I bet it was tense.

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  13. Zmodem

    they should quit wasting time with mars and make a new shuttle, then send the ISS, and then they can drop a full 4x4 from a standing orbit, and drive it about in realtime from the ISS module

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