19 October 2016
Sol 1495: Full drill
The thumbnail of the Sol 1494 MAHLI image showed that the Quela dump pile had been moved by the wind again!
17 October 2016
Sols 1491-1492: Soliday at Sebina
With the weekend plan, we officially started our drill campaign on the target “Sebina,” so we will be staying in this location through the week. On Sol 1491 we dumped out the post-sieve sample from our previous drill hole at “Quela,” and did some brushing on Sebina, followed by APXS and MAHLI imaging. On Sol 1492, the rover did a lot of remote sensing, starting off with an early morning …
12 October 2016
Sols 1489-1490: 100 m of Mount Sharp!
Today’s plan is focused on bumping to our next drill location as we continue to systematically sample the Murray formation. The two-sol plan starts with a Mastcam tau and crater rim extinction observation to measure atmospheric opacity.
11 October 2016
Sols 1487-1488: Cleaning CheMin
While some of us enjoyed the Columbus Day holiday, Curiosity continued working on Mars.
9 October 2016
Sols 1484-1486: Dropping off samples to SAM
The Curiosity rover made another 40 meters of progress up the flank of Mt. Sharp on Sol 1482, and there were multiple bedrock blocks within reach of the arm for the weekend plan.
5 October 2016
Sols 1482-1483: Another touch and go
Curiosity drove another 35 meters on Sol 1480, stopping at a location with a layered bedrock exposure right in front of the rover. So the tactical planning team decided to take advantage of the touch and go option again. MAHLI will take pictures of the layered target “Cassongue” and of the rover wheels before the arm is stowed in preparation for another drive on Sol 1482.
3 October 2016
Sols 1480-1481: Touch and Go!
Curiosity drove 12.5 meters on Sol 1478, to an area with lots of nodules in the bedrock. The tactical planning team decided to exercise the “touch and go” option, so the arm will be deployed for contact science before driving away on Sol 1480.
1 October 2016
Sols 1477-1479: Rocky Road
Everything went well in our previous plan and we are making slow but steady progress over rough terrain toward our next drill location. We should get there by next weekend! Today’s plan starts off with a bunch of remote sensing on Sol 1477. Navcam has an atmospheric observation, followed by ChemCam analysis of the targets “Chadibe”, “Bobonong”, and “Dukwi”. Mastcam will document those targets once ChemCam is done with them, …
