95% of it's down - and of the remaining 5% - it's mostly lower-tier fill in images.

Please read through this thread for all the information. It's been covered already.

No hardware changes from the current design before launch.

We have MARDI doing a movie during descent, we don't need Navcams doing it - and they'll be pointing into the rover deck at that time anyway - along with MastCam I presume.

Doug

Seconded.

I rasterbated the Lion King pan

Strong winds could probably do it if the chute were able to re-inflate - but in a ruffled lump on the surface, no chance. Opportunities didn't even re-inflate after the RAD's fired. I'm guessing the backshell speared straight into the chute or yanked it at such an angle as to deflate it. MPF, MERA - backshell and chute and one beside the other. MERB - the Backshell augered in and made a hell of a mess.

Must have been some cross-winds of some sort at the Phoenix site - on landing, the backshell turned over.

Doug

Oh - yes - that's not going to change. But the chute itself, like Spirits, is doing the 'unmade bed flap'

Doug

It's BnW pan, similar to the Lyell pan - but a bit closer to the cape, not as close as the final nice postcard of the cape however.

Doug

My dream is to take three square chunks from the McMurdo pan 90 degrees apart - print them at 36 inches square - and mount them on three walls of a room.... WINDOWS

The back-lit Saturn image is another must-have.

Several hundred gig. 17.7 gig in my MMB folder alone.

That article was probably penned before this suspected event anyway

Doug

There have been, as far as I can find, 8 HiRISE obs of PHX released to the HiRISE website at full res (i.e. not 2x2 binned)

Of those, 5 are really quite good, 3 are not so great.

So I've overlaid the interesting parts to see any changes. The parachute folds over a bit at some point between Aug 23rd and Sept 19th - other than that, nothing really to see.

The different observing angles are very very obvious when you look at the back-shell on its side. Have a go at convincing yourself you can see changed in the arm work-volume. I couldn't quite see anything.

http://sta.estec.esa.int/Space_Trajectory_...s/Download.html

Only just got it - going to give it a go

It has IMU's and Accelerometers, not Seismometers. This is an issue we've covered before here.

Even if it detected shuddering from a DD (and indeed, there is about a pixels worth of shift at the summit of Husband Hill during strong winds) then by the time the rover had stopped doing whatever it was doing ( if indeed it has the power to be doing anything at that time anyway ) - it wouldn't even know which direction to point the Navcams to take an image of the DD that would be long gone anyway.

The new software to do DD/Cloud watching is a far more sensible and productive means to achieve that sort of thing.

Doug

Something's definitely happened, but those few cells visible in the Pancam frames are less convincing that the large streaks across the right rear array on the Navcam shots.

Exactly - that was my point.

Just looks like a solution searching for a problem to me.

And what does it offer that ASU's Mars Data system doesn't?

MARDI is just imaging - it's not motion estimation like DIMES. I believe the radar for the descent stage will do everything needed in terms of horez. velocity etc. (Phoenix did fine without DIMES, for example)

As for use post-landing. That's not a baseline use or requirement - but Mike Caplinger did mention that they were looking at using it after landing. One potentially use would, of course, be motion estimation for wheel slip calculation.

MGS was a particularly bad case of this, iirc. VERY old avionics compared to Mars Odyssey - (the very very inaccurate and brief version is....) and the guy who'd happily uplinked to MGS for years, retired, and his replacement didn't know the avionics inside out - hence the wrongly uplinked parameter that only got picked up during the solar array motor induced safing event.

Let's set the record straight - while Helen was at the Pony convention in Providence, I had my feet up in an SOWG meeting at Cornell and eating Chinese with Andy Chaikin in Vermont

I spent < 1hr in Providence collecting Helen from the convention

Doug

No - MARDI is on the rover, not the descent stage. It's not used like Dimes. There isn't any similar camera onboard the descent stage.


Doug

Nice to see the tell-tale data out

A few graphs plotting direction, speed, local time etc etc. What's obvious is Northern and Southern winds being the strongest, with little from the East and West.

Oh the Tau on Mars is quite frightful,
But the science is delightful
Since the dust will not go,
Let it blow, let it blow, let it blow.

It doesn't show signs of cleaning,
But the rocks have been revealing,
Water here used to flow,
Let it blow, let it blow, let it blow.

When the uplinked commands are right,
The rover will beep, all is norm,
While the dust grains still cling on tight,
All night long the WEB is still warm.

The rover team won't stop trying,
As long as bit's are flying,
When Watt Hours are really low,
Let it blow, let it blow,let it blow.


Oh crap, I can hear Santa. I'd better go to bed.

To the tune of Little Donkey


Little rover, little rover,
On a northern slope.
Got to keep on charging batteries,
Never give up hope.

Got a high tau, little rover,
Murky skies up high,
Don’t give up now, little rover,
Time will clean the skies.

Clean off those cells tonight
Thin Mars winds, thin Mars winds.
Amp hours swell tonight,
Thin Mars winds, thin Mars winds.

Little rover, Little rover,
Got no end in sight,
Little rover, keep on driving, don't give us a fright

Little rover, little rover,
In your dusty guise,
There are drivers waiting for the
Watt Hours to rise,

Do not falter, little rover,
JPL's awake.
They will guide you, little rover,
Till your wheels all break!


Stu - don't ever tell me I'm not a rover hugger