Sols 924-927: Garden City Here We Come!

13 March 2015

Yesterday was a challenging day on Mars and Earth. On Mars, the rover stopped its drive early because it detected that its wheels were slipping in the sand, so we weren’t where we expected to be and we had to adjust our observations accordingly. At the same time on Earth, some network issues… Read More

PILOT / UPC Data Release December 2014: Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter - Marci

15 December 2014

The NASA/USGS PDS Imaging Node has added the following data to the Unified Planetary Coordinate (UPC) Database. MISSION / INSTRUMENT: MARS RECONNAISSANCE ORBITER / Marci Release #31. Mapped Images: 2,228. Unmapped Images: 315. Please visit PILOT to access/download the new release.

PILOT / UPC Data Release December 2014: Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter - CTX

15 December 2014

The NASA/USGS PDS Imaging Node has added the following data to the Unified Planetary Coordinate (UPC) Database. MISSION / INSTRUMENT: MARS RECONNAISSANCE ORBITER / CTXRelease #31. Mapped Images: 3,852. Unmapped Images: 0. Please visit PILOT to access/download the new release.

Sol 923: Getting out of Dodge

11 March 2015

The plan for today, as our SOWG (Science Operations Working Group) chair put it, is to “get out of Dodge”! We will be driving to a location where we can do “full MAHLI wheel imaging” in the coming sols. During the drive, the rover will stop long enough for Mastcam to get an… Read More

Sol 922: Arm in Action

10 March 2015

Good news! We’re allowed to use the arm again! The engineers have done all the diagnostics needed, and so today’s plan was dominated by arm activities for science. In the morning of sol 922, there is a short science block during which ChemCam and Mastcam will analyze the target… Read More

New Name Approved for Jovian Satellite

10 March 2015

The IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature has approved the name Dia for the Jovian satellite, Jupiter LIII. For more information, see the "Planet and Satellite Names and Discoverers" page in the Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature.

Sol 921: Wrapping Up Diagnostics

9 March 2015

The engineers on the team have been working hard to understand the current fluctuation that caused the arm to halt on Sol 911, and they are expecting to wrap up their diagnostics this week! In the meantime, we on the science team have been keeping ourselves and the rover busy by using the remote… Read More

Sols 918-920: Diagnostic testing

6 March 2015

More diagnostic data are needed to fully understand the cause of the Sol 911 fault, so no arm activities are planned for this weekend.  The Mastcam thermal characterization will be completed early on Sol 918, while it's still cold.  Another test to diagnose the power issue is planned… Read More

Sol 917: Mastcam Thermal Characterization

5 March 2015

I'm MAHLI/MARDI uplink lead today, but there hasn't been much for me to do because of the restriction on arm activities following last week's fault.  The arm is being used exclusively for diagnostic testing to determine the cause of the fault; test results are being analyzed by the MSL… Read More

New Names Approved for Six Features on Ganymede

4 March 2015

The IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature has approved names for six paterae on Ganymede: Hamra, Hammamat, Musa, Natrun, Rum, and Yaroun. For more information, see the Ganymede Map and the Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature.