Happy New Year... on Mars! NASA celebrates as rovers join the party
Mars new year
Happy New Year! We know that the year 2025 is still a few weeks away on Earth, but our neighbour Mars is entering a new year today. The red planet has begun its next revolution of the sun which happens after a long wait.
While Earth revolves in orbit around the sun in 365 days, six hours and nine minutes, it takes Mars 687 Earth days to complete one orbit of the star. The last time it celebrated its new year was on Dec 26, 2022.
NASA posted a message on the social media platform X from its NASA Mars handle, informing readers that Mars is ushering in its new year on Nov 13, 2024. It wrote, "Happy New Year... on Mars!"
"Because the Red Planet takes longer to orbit the Sun than Earth, its year is longer. 687 days, in fact. The last one was celebrated on Dec. 26, 2022."
It also posted a video about Mars' new year, further writing, "Confused? Don't be. This "Mars in a Minute" video has the answers."
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Perseverance Mars Rover also joined in the party, with its handle posting a fun comment under the original post.
Also Read:Mars is full of CO2. Scientists want to make fuel and plastic out of it
"Happy Mars New Year! This is my second trip around the Sun on the Red Planet, and I can't wait for what's yet to explore and discover."
Since a year on Mars is longer than Earth's, humans are way younger on the red planet.
Perseverance landed on the red planet in Feb 2021 and has been tasked with the work of exploring the Jezero Crater and figuring out if life ever existed on the planet, and if yes, then what made it vanish?
The rover is currently climbing the steep slopes of the crater to reach its rim. It is expected to reach the rim by early December.
NASA's video gave a shoutout to the Curiosity rover that landed on Mars in 2012 and was supposed to spend only one Martian year there. However, it is still going strong and exploring the dusty planet. Curiosity's X handle also commented on the post.
"Oh wow, what a throwback to my first extended mission in 2014. And I’m still rollin' and explorin'. Happy (Martian) New Year!"
Since Mars has a longer year than Earth, that translates to longer seasons as well. This means that the Martian winter is also much longer, limiting access to sunlight. The rovers on the red planet face challenges during this time and need to conserve their energy since there is no sunlight to charge their solar panels.
