Ladies and gentlemen, it is with great delight that I can announce the death of the nickname “Waypoint Crater” for the shallow crater Oppy has been approaching over the past few sols. It now has an official (well, actually, semi-official; all the names given to these martian features are not *actually* official until they’re accepted by the Powers That Be, but I’ve yet to hear of any of their working names being rejected so I think they’re safe!) name…
Everyone, please welcome to MER history, “Intrepid Crater”…
Here’s where Oppy is now…
Like all the craters being explored/encountered by Oppy on her epic trek across the great dust sea of Meridiani, Intrepid is named after a famous ship of exploration. A loooong and very convoluted Google search revealed that HMS Intrepid was a Royal Navy ship that was abandoned in the Arctic in 1854 (see image here ) , after taking part in an daring international mission – the famous “Franklin Search Expedition” – to search for a previous expedition to the Arctic which had set out in 1845. You can find full details here…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin’s_lost_expedition
One very interesting fact I discovered during my research was that another of the ships which was with Intrepid in the Arctic was HMS Resolute. HMS Resolute is famous because, after she was broken up, some of her timbers were used to make a desk. Not just any old desk, but a big, hulking desk that now has pride of place in a rather large, oval-shaped office in a rather famous white-coloured house in America…
Nice to see it being treated with respect, isn’t it? 😉
And here’s the now-obligatory 3D view of the crater…
I don’t think Oppy will stay here long. There doesn’t appear to be anything special about Intrepid, no interesting ejacta around it, so the next set of images will very possibly show Intrepid has been passed and Oppy is heading east towards a much larger, much more interesting crater – Santa Maria. It’s now just 1.5km away, and we’re going to have some great views there. What route might Oppy take? Hmm. Maybe something like this…
Watch this space…!
The Road To Endeavour 
Inappropriate remark about the desk.
See http://wonkette.com/413753/black-man-puts-his-feet-on-desk
How big is this crater?
Thank you for your site. I’ve been watching it for the better part of a year now and I wanted to thank you profusely for your enthusiastic coverage of this amazing Mars exploration. You are doing all of us in cyber-world who care deeply about the rover’s mission a great service. Please keep it up and all the best to you and yours.
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