[meteorite-list] Mars Rover Opportunity Update - June 16-20, 2013

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2013 13:13:59 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <201306242013.r5OKDxp3020141_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

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

OPPORTUNITY UPDATE: Opportunity is Healthy and Driving to 'Solander
Point' - sols 3340-3344, Jun. 16, 2013-Jun. 20, 2013:

Opportunity is in good health. As of June 21, 2013, Opportunity has been
on Mars for five Martian years.

The project successfully recovered the rover from the flash-memory write
error induced reset on Sol 3336 (June 12, 2013), which left the rover
without a running master sequence.

The initial recovery attempt on Sol 3337 (June 13, 2013), was not
successful because the rover did not wake earlier enough to receive the
recovery commands, although it was understood that this was a
possibility due to variability in the morning wake-up time. Opportunity
was successfully recovered over Sols 3338 and 3339 (June 14 and 15, 2013).

The second sol also included a 246-foot (75-meter) drive. That drive
contained the first part of a two-sol test of multi-sol autonomous
driving. The rover drove again on Sol 3342 (June 18, 2013), with a
200-foot (61-meter) drive which contained the second part of the
multi-sol autonomous driving. On Sol 3344 (June 20, 2013), the science
team decided to head east toward the feature called 'Nobbys Head' for a
closer look with the rover driving just under 108 feet (33 meters). The
plan ahead is to turn south and make a direct beeline to 'Solander
Point' still over a kilometer away.

As of Sol 3344 (June 20, 2013), the solar array energy production was
497 watt-hours with an atmospheric opacity (Tau) of 0.801 and a solar
array dust factor of 0.626.

Total odometry is 22.89 miles (36.84 kilometers).
Received on Mon 24 Jun 2013 04:13:59 PM PDT