Sols 1364-1365: Analyzing drill sample
6 June 2016The Oudam drill campaign continues to go well, with sample acquired and ready for analysis. Planning is now restricted, so we are planning 2 sols today. On Sol 1364, ChemCam will acquire passive spectra of the drill tailings and a LIBS raster of the wall of the drill hole. … Read More
Sols 1361-1363: Drilling Oudam
3 June 2016The MSL Rover Planners have all the data they need to drill (no "mini-drill" required), so the plan for this weekend focuses on drilling into the Oudam bedrock target. The full drill is scheduled for Sol 1361, followed by MAHLI and Mastcam images of the new hole. The rover will… Read More
Sol 1360: Preparing to drill
2 June 2016Arm work continues to go well, so preparation for drilling and sample analysis is the focus of the Sol 1360 plan. First, CheMin will dump the Lubango and Okoruso drill samples out of their cells. Then ChemCam and Mastcam will observe a bright vein named "Charlottenfelder" and a… Read More
Sol 1359: Cleaning CHIMRA
1 June 2016The remaining Okoruso drill sample was successfully dumped onto the ground on Sol 1358, so MSL is ready for a new drill sample. In preparation, the Sol 1359 plan includes an arm preload test on "Oudam," the next drill target, and cleaning out CHIMRA with imaging to verify that everything… Read More
Sol 1358: A Simple Plan
31 May 2016Our activities over the weekend went well, and after a couple of complicated multi-sol plans we get to do a nice simple one-sol plan today! The Sol 1358 plan starts with ChemCam observations of the targets “Otiiha”, “Otjihase”, “Otjikoto”, and… Read More
Sol 1355-1357: Coordinating with MRO
27 May 2016Our drive went well and Curiosity is now sitting on a nice patch of the Murray formation, putting us in a good position for a very busy holiday weekend! On Sol 1355, ChemCam has observations of the targets “Auchas”, “Kaisosi”, “Inamagando”, and… Read More
Sols 1353-1354: Clear sailing
26 May 2016The Sol 1352 post-drive imaging shows that, while there are sandy ripples ahead, there are enough rocky patches that the rover should not have any problem driving toward the southwest. This is what we were hoping, so we are planning to drive in that direction on Sol 1353. But… Read More
Sol 1352: Scouting a path
25 May 2016We'd like to keep driving toward the southwest, but can't see all of the terrain ahead from our current location. So the Sol 1352 plan includes a short drive to give us a better view. Before the rover moves, Mastcam will acquire a large stereo mosaic of the "Breckhorn" ridge in… Read More
Sol 1351: Ridge chemistry
24 May 2016MSL is in a good position for contact science on the small ridge in front of the rover, so the Sol 1351 operations team decided to stay here and acquire chemical data. First, CheMin will return the results of the latest analysis of the Lubango drill sample while ChemCam observes rock… Read More
Sol 1350: Data processing delay
23 May 2016I'm SOWG Chair again today, and started browsing the latest data from MSL early this morning. To my dismay, the post-drive images that we expected to receive in time for planning today were not available! It turned out that the data were received on Earth, but the Mars Reconnaissance… Read More
