Spirit - 2010 Winter@Troy, The first stationary science campaign Options

[Astro0]

Well, with perhaps a few more weeks of tilt-enhancing drives to go and then settling in for the winter, I thought it might be a good time to have a thread dedicated to ideas and observations that will come. It's likely that we won't hear much from Spirit during the coldest part of winter (April-June) possibly longer. There'll hopefully be beeps to tell us that she's still alive.

Already there are plans for radio science and determining the fluidity or otherwise of the Martian core, plus weather observations, surface changes etc.
What else could you think of that Spirit could do? Remember that she's not going anywhere (vonBraun is out)

In the meantime, have you sent your postcard to Spirit yet?! It's a great idea from the Mars outreach team.
http://beamartian.jpl.nasa.gov/spiritpostcards
What would you say to Spirit?

[Explorer1]

Greetings everyone. Longtime lurker here (since the mer.rlproject.com days!) and I finally have a question that I can't find the answer too. Here goes:

The Viking landers lasted for many years on the Martian surface, immobile. Is there some technical reason their comm. data cannot be used for measurements of Mars's interior, like the long-term plans are for Spirit? I'm just asking because I find it hard to believe that no one would use that 30+ year old data to do the same things we're doing now. There must be some good reason they can't be used.

Thanks, and keep up the good work keeping this place great!

[sgendreau]

The Viking landers lasted for many years on the Martian surface, immobile. Is there some technical reason their comm. data cannot be used for measurements of Mars's interior, like the long-term plans are for Spirit?

I believe Squyres said in one of his interviews that the Vikings did not collect the appropriate type of data. Sorry, no link.