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4 June 2019
Sol 2424-2426: West Side Multispectral Story
Today we planned the weekend activities for Curiosity in Woodland Bay. Woodland Bay is a location in Glen Torridon, in the clay bearing unit.
28 June 2016
Sol 1385: Drive Curiosity rover, then drive some more
Not a lot to report today: these one-sol drive plans are pretty simple! (Well, as simple as driving a giant robot on another planet can be…) Yesterday’s Curiosity rover drive took us a little over 60m and we’re planning another drive in the sol 1385 plan. Before the drive, we have a short science block with a ChemCam observation of the target “Epembe” and a Mastcam mosaic of “Baynes Mountain” …
1 June 2016
Sol 1359: Cleaning CHIMRA (Collection and Handling for In-Situ Martian Rock Analysis device)
The 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 is clean. Before all the arm activities, ChemCam and Mastcam will observe the Okoruso dump pile and a bedrock target …
23 April 2016
Sols 1320-1322: Drilling at Lubango
The contact science activities on Sol 1319 went well, and we analyzed another DRT location with MAHLI and APXS. The drill pre-load test suggested that the Lubango block might have moved slightly, but the RPs feel comfortable to go ahead and drill in the weekend plan. I was on duty as GSTL again today, and it’s always exciting when we get to drill a new sample on Mars. In addition …
21 February 2016
Sols 1256-1261: Driving Around the Dune
Apologies for the lateness of this week’s update: The rover is fine, gradually working its way around the north end of a large dune. I’m just an absent-minded blogger with too many other things going on! We started this week on Tuesday with the Sol 1256 plan. This included some long distance ChemCam RMi images of a location on Mt. Sharp that I have been advocating for, plus some small …
23 December 2015
Sol 1202-1213: Holidays on Earth, Busy Days on Mars
Today’s plan is a four sol Holiday plan covering Sol 1202-1205, and it will be followed by some pre-planned activities to take us all the way until Sol 1214 and the new year here on Earth, so there’s a lot to talk about! On Sol 1202, we will first repeat the ChemCam RMI and Mastcam change detection images that we’ve been acquiring of the nearby dunes. Then the arm will …
16 May 2011
Utah Mars Analogs
Greetings from Los Angeles! I’m in California this week for the 5th and final MSL Landing Site Workshop. Since that is sure to provide some tasty blog-fodder, I thought I should sit down and write about my trip to Utah two weeks ago.
Why did I go to Utah? Because the latest MSL camera team meeting was held in Moab, and I was hoping to give a brief presentation about some work I’ve been doing on the side (in all my copious free time) with the calibration data for the Mastcams. Unfortunately, I can’t write about what happened at the business part of the meeting because then I would have to kill you. Or more likely Mike Malin would kill me. It turned out there wasn’t time for me or my adviser to give our presentations, but it was still a great trip because after the “sit in a room all day and watch powerpoint presentations” part of the meeting, came the field trip!
12 August 2010
Molar Tooth Texture
Ok, so remember the weird rock I showed in my Galcier Park geology post? No? Here it is again: This texture is called “molar-tooth” texture, because apparently someone thought it looked like the teeth of elephants. They must have been studying some weird elephants. It’s a very bizarre texture. It cuts across the layers of the rock as if it is related to fractures, but it is often deformed and …
7 August 2010
The Geology of Glacier National Park: Part 1
Well, the field trip is over and I am happy to say that I was not eaten by any bears. They seemed much more interested in the huckleberries. I am also happy to say that I know a little bit more about the geology of Glacier National Park (and about how to interpret sedimentary geology in general) than I did before I left. The park is famous for its large-scale …
