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Mars rover spots UFO

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PASADENA, Calif., March 18 (UPI) -- NASA scientists said Thursday the Spirit rover on Mars apparently has spotted an unidentified flying object streaking across the planet's sky.

The scientists said the object could be the first meteor seen from the surface of another planet, or another NASA spacecraft sent to explore Mars nearly 30 years ago.

The sighting was an accident. Spirit was photographing the Martian sky with its panoramic camera when one of the images it sent back to Earth contained a streak -- the brightest object in the sky at the time.

Spirit's mission controllers said the streak probably was a meteor entering the thin Martian atmosphere at high speed. However, it also could have been the Viking 2 orbiter, which was sent to Mars in 1976. Though the craft's power systems shut down years ago, it is still circling the red planet in a polar orbit -- a path that matches the direction of the streak in Spirit's photograph.

Unidentified Object

Only occasionally does it raise its sights towards the sky to study the atmosphere of Mars.

But it was on just such an occasion when Spirit was observing the sky with the green filter of its panoramic camera that the roving geologist came across the surprise - a streak across the peach-coloured Martian heavens.

Mission controllers say the streak was probably the brightest object in the sky at the time.

If the UFO was not a shooting a star then it could have been one of seven out-of-commission spacecraft that still orbit Mars.

From the object's motion, scientists do not think it was the Russian probes Mars 2, Mars 3, Mars 5, or Phobos 2; or the American probes Mariner 9 or Viking 1.

That leaves Viking 2, which has a polar orbit that would fit with the north-south orientation of the streak.

In addition, only Viking 1 and 2 are in orbits that could produce the type of motion as fast as that seen by Spirit.