
MSL roved 53 meters on
Sol 1446, and ended up in an area with nice
exposures of bedrock. We were interested in taking
MAHLI close-up images of the bedrock but were concerned that they would not be very useful if the surface as dusty as it typically is. We therefore considered using the
ChemCam laser to clean off some of the dust and get chemical information before deploying the arm, but recognized that the
MAHLI targets would be partly shadowed by the arm turret, which would make the
MAHLI images more difficult to interpret. Adding the arm activities would also leave less time for driving, so we had a lot of trade-offs to consider and it was a busy day for me as
SOWG Chair! We finally decided not to include the
MAHLI images in the plan, and focus instead on
Mastcam imaging of the nearby buttes and maximizing the drive distance. We were also able to fit
ChemCam and
Mastcam observations of the “Luxilo” bedrock target into the plan, along with Right
Mastcam images of the “Caxito” laminated exposure and the
Sol 1446 AEGIS target. After the drive and usual post-drive imaging,
SAM will clean its scrubber overnight. On
Sol 1449,
Mastcam will again measure the amount of dust in the atmosphere and
ChemCam will autonomously perform another AEGIS activity.
by Ken Herkenhoff
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.