[meteorite-list] NASA's Spirit Stages Martian Stand-Up Performance

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:32:00 2004
Message-ID: <200401110023.QAA01336_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Guy Webster (818) 354-6278
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

Donald Savage (202) 358-1547
NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C.

NEWS RELEASE: 2004-014 January 10, 2004

NASA'S SPIRIT STAGES MARTIAN STAND-UP PERFORMANCE

NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit has successfully completed its
stand-up activities by extending the rear wheels. This puts the
rover into a fully opened configuration for the first time since pre-
launch testing in Florida last spring.

Meanwhile, the rover is sending home sections of a 360-degree color
panorama it has taken and stored onboard, plus other information
about the terrain around its landing site, Columbia Memorial Station
in Mars' Gusev Crater.

Mission managers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena,
Calif., have decided that changing the tilt of the lander platform
will not be necessary before the rover drives off, possibly allowing
drive-off to occur late Tuesday night or early Wednesday, Pacific
Standard Time.

JPL's Chris Voorhees, who led the engineering team that planned the
unfolding sequences for Spirit and its sister rover, Opportunity,
said "Spirit has spent most of the last seven months scrunched up
inside of a tetrahedral-shaped lander, and that is not the shape a
rover wants to be. Over the last several days, Spirit has performed
a sort of reverse robotic origami."

"The rover now stands at its full height and all six wheels are in
position for driving on the surface of Mars," said Jennifer Trosper,
mission manager at JPL.

The rover is still attached to the lander. The next step planned for
Saturday evening (Pacific Standard Time) is to command the rover to
release connections between the middle wheels and the lander. Under
best-case conditions, severing the final cable connection is planned
for Sunday night, followed by clockwise turns totaling 120 degrees
on Monday night into Tuesday, then drive-off toward the northwest on
the following martian day.

Pictures from Spirit's panoramic camera continue to provide details
about the martian ground and sky. The rover transmitted home about
180 megabits of science data in the past martian day, nearly 10
times the maximum daily capability of Mars Pathfinder in 1997.

JPL geologist Dr. Matt Golombek, co-chair of the steering committee
that evaluated potential landing sites for Spirit and Opportunity,
said the pictures are confirming some predictions about the Gusev
site. Rocks cover less of the ground than at the three previous Mars
landing sites -- about three percent of ground area around Spirit
compared with about 20 percent of the ground around each of Mars
Pathfinder, Viking 1 and Viking 2.

Presenting the latest high-resolution color mosaic from Spirit,
Golombek said, "This is without question the smoothest, flattest
place we've ever landed on Mars, with the possible exception of
Viking 2."

Dr. Mark Lemmon a member of the rover science team from Texas A & M
University, College Station, said the atmosphere at Spirit's site is
dustier than at previous landing sites, except during dust storms
observed by the Viking landers. The dust colors the sky and affects
the appearance of objects on the ground.

Higher above the ground, atmospheric densities predicted for
Spirit's descent closely matched the true conditions measured from
the spacecraft's deceleration, said JPL's Dr. Joy Crisp. That is a
good sign for Opportunity's descent two weeks from now, though risks
remain high for any landing on Mars.

Spirit arrived at Mars Jan. 3 (EST and PST; Jan. 4 Universal
Time) after a seven-month journey. Its task is to spend the
next three months exploring for clues in rocks and soil about
whether the past environment in Gusev Crater was ever watery
and suitable to sustain life.

Spirit's twin Mars Exploration Rover, Opportunity, will reach its
landing site on the opposite side of Mars on Jan. 25 (EST and
Universal Time; 9:05 p.m., Jan. 24, PST) to begin a similar
examination of a site on the opposite side of the planet from Gusev
Crater. As of Sunday morning, Opportunity will have flown 428
million kilometers (266 million miles) since launch and will still
have 28 million kilometers (17 million miles) to go before landing.
JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in
Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's
Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. Images and
additional information about the project are available from JPL
at

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.html

and from Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., at

http://athena.cornell.edu/ .

                                -end-
Received on Sat 10 Jan 2004 07:23:34 PM PST