Spirit

Like painted kites, those days and nights
went flyin' by
The world was new, beneath a blue
umbrella sky

Then softer than a piper man,
one day it called to you
And I lost you, I lost you to
the summer wind...

NASA engineers are hoping those words, famously crooned by Frank Sinatra, don't come true this summer for the unflappable Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity.

Summer is approaching on Mars, and with it comes the onset of huge wind storms that kick dust around the twin Mars Exploration Rovers and their life-giving solar panels.

It would have been pretty heartbreaking for space fans if Spirit and Opportunity, the twin Martian rovers, had survived on the Red Planet all these years, only to be shut down and lost for good due to budget cuts.

Apparently NASA sent a letter last week to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the lab that runs the rovers' program, specifying a $4 million cut. Scientists said this move would have forced them to put one rover into hibernation mode, and limit the duties of the other.

When NASA's Phoenix lander parachutes from orbit and touches down on the outskirts of Mars' northern polar ice cap on May 25, it will join the Spirit and Opportunity Mars Exploration Rovers as NASA's active roster on the planet's surface. And, as is typical of the youngest child, Phoenix will receive the majority of NASA's attention during its mission.

Day 1,464 of the Mars rovers' 90-day mission to Mars (for those of you keeping track), and Steve Squires, the head of science operations for the Spirit and Opportunity rovers is getting us up to date on their latest findings. Most important: serendipity in action. The Spirit rover's right front wheel has broken, so engineers turn the rover around, drive it in reverse, and drag the wheel behind the rover. As it slogs across the planet, it carves a trench. And my, what a trench it carves.