[meteorite-list] Mars Exploraton Rover Update - March 15, 2005

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon Mar 21 13:24:57 2005
Message-ID: <200503161600.j2GG0NO22770_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/status.html

OPPORTUNITY UPDATE: Examining a Little Crater Before Moving on Toward
'Vostok' - sol 389-395, March 15, 2005

The rover took some time away from driving and explored a little crater
it approached last week. Once Opportunity is done with the crater, plans
call for continuing toward a larger crater, "Vostok." With its front
legs just on the lip of the small crater, Opportunity was able to extend
its robotic arm to characterize some of the mineralogy found here.

Sol-by-sol summaries:

The last previous drive left Opportunity in a position where it could
make its final approach to the lip of one of the craters in a cluster of
three small craters. On sol 389 (Feb. 26, 2005) the rover took images of
the site with its panoramic camera and its miniature thermal emission
spectrometer. On sol 390, Opportunity took a panoramic camera mosaic of
the crater, then bumped forward to the edge of the crater. Sol 391 was
another day of remote-sensing science and rest.

For sol 392, the team decided to take an in situ look at a rock target
called "Normandy." The Mossbauer spectrometer was placed on the rock and
it conducted a three-hour long integration. Then the rover switched to
the alpha particle X-ray spectrometer and performed a very short
(10-minute) measurement. The science team needed a sample reading, and
by using this technique, the engineering team was able to give the
scientists some idea of what they had in time for a communication window
with Mars Odyssey. The science team used this data to determine if sol
393 would be a grinding day (with the rock abrasion tool). After getting
the alpha particle X-ray spectrometer reading, the rover went to sleep,
woke up at about 4:00 a.m. local solar time and started collecting data
again with the alpha particle X-ray spectrometer. The instrument ran for
about 6 hours.

On sol 393, the rover switched back to the Mossbauer spectrometer and
started a very long (about 12-hour) integration. The rover was able to
use the mini-deep-sleep mode after the integration.

Plans for sols 394 and 395, uplinked on March 3, call for the rover to
stow its robotic arm and back away from the crater on sol 394. At this
point the rover will take some remote-sensing images. After confirmation
that these important images have been acquired, Opportunity will turn
and drive toward Vostok.
Received on Wed 16 Mar 2005 11:00:22 AM PST