Opportunity’s Solar-Powered Odyssey Surpasses Its Limits

Opportunity exceeded its 90-sol, 600-metre primary mission by driving about 45.16 kilometres over 14.5 years on Mars; a 2018 global dust storm cut sunlight, preventing wake-up after a prolonged discharge and ending with its last transmission on sol 5111. The famous line about a low battery was a human interpretation of telemetry, not the rover’s own words. NASA declared the mission complete in February 2019, and Opportunity’s endurance and geology work shaped later Mars missions and rover design.