7 February 2017

Sol 1602: Bagnold Dunes 2: Electric Boogaloo

Posted by Ryan Anderson

Navcam view of Bagnold dunes

The weekend plan for Curiosity went well and today we begin the second half of the campaign to study the “Bagnold Dunes.” The Sol 1602 plan starts off with two Mastcam mosaics of the dunes which will be repeated several times later in the sol to watch for changes. Navcam also has a dust devil monitoring observation in the morning science block. Around midday, Mastcam will do a couple of measurements to determine the amount of dust in the atmosphere, and ChemCam will do an active LIBS observation of the soil target “Mapleton” as the final step in the diagnostics that will allow it to return to active duty! In addition to change detection, Mastcam has a stereo image of some bedforms at “Flume Ridge,” a 9×2 mosaic of the interesting nearby dune field, and a 3×2 observation in support of the campaign to watch for dust devils. Later in the sol, MAHLI will have a field day, observing the targets “Scarboro,” “McKenny,” “Matagamon,” “Flume Ridge,” “The Forks,” and “West Branch.” The rest of the sol involves repeating the Mastcam change detection observations, going all the way until 7:30 in the evening.

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