Third stage cutoff!

Fairing sep, third stage ignition...

OK through booster sep...

Starsem still doesn't work for me bu thankfully the ESA feed does (thanks Waspie_Dwarf!)

Ah, cross posting, a much more useful site.

Starts only 5 mins before launch...

Anybody getting a feed from here yet?

Just wondering if the error message I'm getting is because it hasn't starting or if there is an incompatibilty with the OSX version of Media Player.

James

I think the definition is based on the the particle size and the flow velocity that created them. I saw a graph showing where the dividing lines are not long ago, but now I look for it I can't find it (or anything like it) typical!

Very nice! Thanks Tman.

The BBC's definition of 'giant asteroid' obviously differs from mine!

What adjective are they going to use when Dawn flys!

James

The Linux version of v1.0.7 works fine for me.

An analysis of the latest hazcams (651)

Here
and here

Shows that Spirt is currently on a ~16 degree slope

Looking at the latest navcam images e.g this one. A quick analysis on a few rocks on the road ahead shows that the slope is a pretty constant ~17 degrees.

No problem!

James

With regard to a possible recent cleaning event,



Two colour sundial images from MMB. L456, Sol 609 on the left, Sol 620 on the right, taken with the sun from as similar an angle as I could find.

Note the vertical red 'stripe' on the sundial mast appears to have vanished!

=> Enough wind across rover deck to move dust.

=> More power for Oppy (maybe).

Looks like this happened between Sol 614 and 616.


James

P.S. Had a quick look back and I think that stripe has been there since the late 400's

Good to see you've started to address the S1K problem

Well spotted Doug, they do look pristine in that frame. With all the dust being blown around at Meridiani lately (from the tracks, and onto the hazcams) I was wondering about possible cleaning events.

Here's hoping,

James

Looks to me like the "splats" started after the whells on that side crossed the last ripple. The tracks look pretty deep there; that would be my guess for where the material was picked up.

James

Thanks for the update Alan and congratulations on your teams discovery.


Just to make an obvious point,

Recently on this board we have discussed how NH would have to be very lucky to fly by two Kuiper Belt objects after Pluto-Charon. Now we get two for free! Should get a sample of five now, NH just became even better value!

James

That's not the way I read the PDT (Pancam Data Tracking, I think it's time to abbreviate this) I beleve that it reads

navcam_7x1_az_288_3_bpp

7 navcam frames centred at az 288 degrees

navcam_3x1_az_108_1_bpp

3 navcam frames centred at az 108 degrees

Note that 288 - 108 = 180. i.e the centres are in opposite directions. Also note that 10 navcam frames generally make a 360 degree pan.

So these two lines should be read together as simply "A 360 degree navcam pan".

James

Yes, clearly we have a drive with 360 deg navcam pan and 6 frame pancam pan of the drop-off after, like we've seen many times already. (There also looks like there will be some pancam work of the area they have just been working and of the RAT.)

Question is: How far will the drive be? We were only 20m from the drop-off so we could end up quite close to it after this drive. Here's hoping!

James

Well data tracking is back and it looks like were back on the road tosol (649)

649 p0655.03 0 0 0 0 0 0 navcam_5x1_az_90_3_bpp
649 p1201.17 0 0 0 0 0 0 front_haz_penultimate_1_bpp_crit_16
649 p1214.05 0 0 0 0 0 0 front_hazcam_ultimate_4_bpp
649 p1301.06 0 0 0 0 0 0 penultimate_rear_hazcam_pri_16
649 p1312.09 0 0 0 0 0 0 ultimate_rear_hazcam_2_bpp_pri15
649 p1755.01 0 0 0 0 0 0 navcam_5x1_az_270_1_bpp

and including

649 p2396.06 0 0 0 0 0 0 pancam_drive_direction_6cx1r_L7R1

James - hoping for a view down the step...

Actually it's -104 to +90 in elevation (and for completeness 0 to 370 in azimuth)



No of course not, I deliberately didn't quote that bit of your post as I wasn't making any reference to that.

However the image fredk posted is made of several pancam frames stacked together, so the direction of rotation can be deduced. I just had a quick look and the stars are moving clockwise (down the image, with the centre of rotation to the left) which makes that the south pole they are rotating around and hence this is the southen sky.

James

When I talked to Steve Squyres a few months back he said that dust accumulation on the panels after a storm was not a consern. Lets worry about the storm itself for now.

James

No, the pancam can look vertically up, (more than) vertically down and anywhere inbetween.

Thanks for the rumour Doug. Good to know we may get the information back sometime.

I was really coming to rely on it, no longer good enough to look at the latest images and see what the rovers have been up to, I want to know what they are going to be up to!

James

Which of course is probably close to reality (rings like this are nearly always spherical(ish) shells) but that must be a coincidence right? Your not guessing the 3D structure before making these images are you; just running a mathematical routine?

James

And while the're at it I wouldn't mind knowing where these sampling site candidates are too!

Pretty please?

James