2006 12 07, December 7th, 2006 Options

[OWW]

I’m Jake Matijevic of the Mars Exploration Rover project and this is the flight director’s report for December 7th, 2006.

Today it’s sol 1041 on Spirit and Spirit is going to begin another segment of its drive to a target called “Esperanza”. This is the first true drive after the winter campaign for Spirit to actually move to a new location in the Gusev basin. Once in position Spirit will begin to do a detailed investigation of this particular rock and in addition to that we will be doing remote science measurements of points of interest in the Gusev basin.

On the other side of the planet it’s sol 1021 for MER-B. Today Opportunity will be commanded to move to a new site. It has been taking a series of images of a promontory at a place called “Bottomless Bay”. The motion today will allow Opportunity to actually move to the northeast portion of “Bottomless Bay” and continue to take measurements of this promontory and the portions of “Victoria” crater.

Both vehicles are healthy. Opportunity, as well as Spirit, has seen warming temperatures as the spring season approaches. And that’s the report from Mars today.