10 September 2016

Sols 1456-1458: Settling in at Quela

Posted by Ryan Anderson

Hazcam view of Quela

We had a successful drive yesterday, and Curiosity is now parked at our next drill site, called “Quela”, right at the base of one of the Murray Buttes. The Sol 1456 plan starts with a Mastcam atmospheric observation, followed by ChemCam and Mastcam of “Quela” and a Mastcam mosaic of the workspace. After that, samples of “Marimba” will be dropped off in SAM for analysis.

On Sol 1457 Mastcam has another tau, and we will dump out the remaining Marimba sample and take some pictures of it. After that Curiosity will brush the dust off of Quela, with MAHLI images before and after, and APXS will do an overnight analysis.

In the morning on Sol 1458, Navcam, Mastcam, and ChemCam have a series of atmospheric observations. These will be followed by Mastcam multispectral observations of the Marimba dump pile, and another ChemCam passive sky and Mastcam tau. ChemCam will also analyze a block of Stimson material called “Uutapi”. Mastcam will document Uutapi and take a mosaic of some other blocks of rock that have fallen off the butte, collectively called “Cuimba”.

by Ryan Anderson

Dates of planned rover activities described in these reports are subject to change due to a variety of factors related to the martian environment, communication relays and rover status