MSL Route Map Options

[kymani76]

Sol 3345 update


RGB color version

[PaulH51]

Sol 3345 drive. The first drive of the year, of about 30m, took Curiosity to a new quadrangle (name to be made public soon, hopefully).
Fernando

The new quadrangle name is 'Roraima'. It’s named after the northern-most state of Brazil and Mount Roraima. The terrain in the Roraima region on Earth is similar to this area on Mars – flat-topped hills and some steep slopes. Refer to: https://mars.nasa.gov/msl/mission-updates/9...indo-a-roraima/

[kymani76]

Sol 3347 update

[nogal]

Sol 3347. A drive to the south of about 14m through terrain "with limited visibility".
I will add the name "Mirador" (Lookout point) when I'm able to conclusively locate the "distant butte" it refers to.


Path data source: JPL/NASA.
Fernando
_____________________________________________________________________
The Martian Way files can also be downloaded from:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1OJH...BbQ?usp=sharing

Included are "The Martian Way" KMZ file, User's Guide, and MSL Orbital map of Gale crater.

[kymani76]

Real climbing ahead. Perspective view of Curiosity on sol 3347.

[PaulH51]

Real climbing ahead. Perspective view of Curiosity on sol 3347.

Do you have any estimates for the heights of the buttes around the rover?

[djellison]

I took Fred & Tims maps from http://bit.ly/MSL_Basemap and via QGIS made a few maps that'll let you read out the altitude of the nearby topography. For what it's worth I think the largest butte due south of the rover right now is ~53 meters to the top from the current location and ~40m from its base to the top.

Threw some more maps here : https://dougellison.smugmug.com/Projects/Gale-Maps/

Attached thumbnail(s)

 

[kymani76]

Do you have any estimates for the heights of the buttes around the rover?

Yes of course I do. Here is a map with absolute elevations in meters:

[kymani76]

..and version with elevations expressed as heights above ground:

The tallest butte in this view is about 18 meters in height (measured from its base).

[PaulH51]

thanks guys Much appreciated

[fredk]

heights above ground

I'm curious exactly what you did there - you've clearly not just subtracted a fixed offset elevation. Maybe you subtracted the elevation map smoothed over some horizontal scale? What scale did you use?

[kymani76]

I'm curious exactly what you did there

I used a common Lidar processing technique. I took the HiRise Gale crater DEM and created new raster where relative heights (or prominences) to the base ground are calculated.
It's usually used to measure building and treetop heights here on Earth, but can also be used to measure ridges, or as in this case buttes on Mars.
I found a nice graphical explanation explaining the procedure here.

And here is resulting map, where slope raster is combined with height above ground raster for the current Curiosity's location:


Hope this helps, Jaka

[ngunn]

It is great to see these maps with elevation contours added. Thanks so much for posting them. Is there any chance that this could become a standard feature of the route maps?

[kymani76]

Curiosity moved another 40 meters to the south on sol 3349.

[kymani76]

Is there any chance that this could become a standard feature of the route maps?

As requested..map update with contours present, for now in BW only, color image still needs some alignment work.