What is NASA's explanation for this anomoly?

What is that white glowing object in the distance?

reply to post by hotrice


It's Opportunity Heat Shield

i believe that to be swamp gas. either that or its a combination of solar lights and weather ballons . or possible a chinse lantern

Some Extreme Close Ups


Close UP With Contrast Alterations


Close UP With Contrast Alterations


Close UP With Contrast Alterations


Close UP With Contrast Alterations


Close UP With Contrast Alterations

yes with those close ups you can clerly see bigfoot hiding behind that second rock.

i am guessing due to its intensity it is a very bright source. therefore i conclude from further analysis that the object in the photo is most likely to be nothing more then a simple reflection of the sun which is the brightest object. case closed on this one.

reply to post by hotrice


Looks like Frosty the Snowman to me. A big Frosty the Snowman too!

I'm sorry but these suspected anomaly closely resembles an alien gray. If you look close you can see its BIG HEAD!!!! This must be the 10ft giants Astronauts seen in top secret NASA movie studios. Heh. Just kidding. But parachutes, heat shields and such make sense since they are in close proximity of the piece of junk that costs millions of dollars. It's a movie prop. It collects rocks and dust for no real purpose. It's obsolete technology. It's a "road closed" sign with all the other orange cones along side of the road. Maybe sometime in the future technology will be so advanced that they will have big yellow blinking lights. Give me a break. NASA is a fraud. They serve no real purpose. Their just a coverup operation. They should be shutdown and recycled into car parts and guns. Laser guns.

As said, it's Opportunity's heat shield, i'll be more detailed now
The image was composed by using images taken by Opportunity Navigation Camera during Sol 115
In the following illustration you can see it from two different angles:

its appearance looks different because of the so called "bleeding" effect: this image became famous because of the presence of the object that looks like a piece of wood. But the glowing object in the distance IS Opportunity's heat shield: you can even see the darkened area close to it: that's the heat shield's impact site.

More Opportunity's heat shield images

marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov...
marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov...
thecrit.com...
marsfossil.home.netcom.com...

I'm sure it has been covered already, but is that a Log (as in petrified tree log) on the ground just in front of the rover?

C-BuZz

reply to post by hotrice


Heat shield would make sense since it's glowing.

-Ign0RanT

Originally posted by nnelsosj
Some Extreme Close Ups

Close UP With Contrast Alterations

Close UP With Contrast Alterations

Close UP With Contrast Alterations

Close UP With Contrast Alterations

Close UP With Contrast Alterations

Whatever that thing is it appears to be giving off heat

Originally posted by TallWhites
...Whatever that thing is it appears to be giving off heat

Well, it IS the lander's heat shield, so at one time it was very hot. However, by the time this photo was taken, I'm sure the heat shield had already cooled off and was probably at the same temperature as it's ambient surroundings.

That pixelization you see in the photos isn't the heat shield radiating heat, but rather a product of the 'JPEG' digital image file itself (i.e., it's not really there, it's a problem with the picture). That particular JPEG image artifact is called a "Blocking Artifact" or "Compression Artifact" and is caused by the compression algorithm that JPEG uses to compress the digital image into a smaller-bit file.

[edit on 11/29/2008 by Soylent Green Is People]