NASA’s Opportunity Rover Snaps Photo of a Martian Dust Devil on Its Tail

Opportunity has been on Mars for over 4,300 Martian days.

NASA’s Opportunity rover captured an amazing image of a dust devil swirling on Mars’ Marathon Valley on March 31, or the 4,332 Martian day of the rover's work. The image was then posted by NASA on April 4. However, this is not the first time a Martian dust devil has been caught on camera.

Back in 2012, NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter captured a dust devil that rose more than half a mile high as it passed over the red planet’s Amazonis Planitia, and in 2005, Opportunity’s sister explorer Spirit captured this dusty devil making its way across the terrain:

According to NASA, dust devils form on Mars the same way they do in deserts here on Earth.

“You need strong surface heating, so the ground can get hotter than the air above it,” explained Mark T. Lemmon, associate research scientist in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas A&M University, on NASA’s Science News web page.

Heated less-dense air close to the ground rises, which punches through the layer of cooler, denser air above. This rising hot air and falling cool air begins circulating vertically in convective cells. Now, if a horizontal gust of wind blows through, “it turns the convection cells on their sides, so they begin spinning horizontally, forming vertical columns — and starting a dust devil,” Lemmon continued.

SEE ALSO: Why We Can’t Investigate the Water on Mars

The only reason we can see them is because of the dust and dirt they suck up as they rotate.

Both Opportunity and Spirit rovers landed on Mars in 2004, with the task of searching for signs of past water activity on the Martian planet. After finding that evidence they both kept exploring, but unfortunately Spirit was declared “dead” in 2011 once communications with Earth ceased.

However, Opportunity continues to roam the planet, capturing spectacular images like the one seen above.