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Thinking Happy Thoughts, Opportunity's Best Mission Moments.....so far
Astro0
post Jul 23 2007, 12:46 AM
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Opportunity is far from beaten, and I for one believe (hope) that she has a long way to go yet.

While 'The Storm' thread is a bit doom and gloom for the moment, I thought it might also be good to focus on all the fantastic highlights that have occurred during Opportunity's mission so far.

For me, I think seeing those first images inside Eagle Crater and the obvious layered rocks that appeared to be just metres away. Then that first big view into Endurance Crater. That huge maw with those fantastic rippled dunes. Of course the drive along the Erebus Highway was incredible and Payson Passage. Then the drive towards the Beacon, and the first view into VC from Duck Bay.

OK, so the entire mission has been great, but what are your highlights!?

It's time for some positive thoughts smile.gif

Astro0
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Del Palmer
post Jul 23 2007, 01:29 AM
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All of the above and I'd like to add observations of the heat shield, along with Heat Shield Rock*, the first meteorite observed up-close on Mars - way cool! smile.gif

* "This is a huge surprise, though maybe it shouldn't have been. I never thought we would get to use our instruments on a rock from someplace other than Mars." - Steve Squyres
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nprev
post Jul 23 2007, 03:57 AM
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Hate to say it, but by far the biggest charge was seeing that beautiful, unmistakable sedimentary stratum staring Oppy in the face from Sol 0 back in Eagle Crater. What a mind-shift from Viking & Pathfinder, what an unusually appropriate harbinger of wonders yet to come...knew right then & there that Opportunity was the best possible name for this mission... smile.gif


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CosmicRocker
post Jul 23 2007, 05:14 AM
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Hehe, I was also going to comment on the the initial view. I can give you a thousand others that came later in the mission, but that first look, showing Opportunity in a crater with that "big" cliff on the opposite side was something I will never forget. Watching her drive drive across the crater and show me that the cliff was merely a curb is also something I will not forget.

My favorite observation came from pancams that came later. I'll have to find the images, but I clearly recall seeing images that displayed not only fine bedding/laminations in the rock, but also indications of cross bedding in those rocks, even before Oppy left the lander.

Del Palmer: That's a great quote I hadn't heard before. Thanks for posting it.


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climber
post Jul 23 2007, 05:25 AM
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Yes, the first view! And even more, the first view of all the team in front of the screen at JPL...staring at this first view and knowing they did something BIG.


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Astro0
post Jul 23 2007, 06:59 AM
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Yep, climber reminded me...
At the Canberra DSN, we were on both Spirit and Opportunity for their landings and I must admit, the best moment was seeing the faces at JPL mission operations and their reaction when the landings were confirmed - the cheers, the laughter, excitement, hi-fives and hugs. I also remember holding my breath for 10 minutes or so when Spirit's signalled disappeared, and the joy when Opportunity's signal stayed locked for the entire bounce and roll sequence.
Being a part of that was definitely a highlight for me.

Astro0
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Stu
post Jul 23 2007, 07:19 AM
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Good topic! smile.gif

Yep, the landing was a very emotional, very exciting time, and seeing clips on science programs still makes me shiver, but as a self-confessed "scenery freak" I think my pre-Victoria highlight was getting to and then into Endurance. I must admit I got rather sick of sol after sol of endless rippling dust dunes, so when Burns Cliff appeared on the horizon, catching the sunlight and looking like the fossilised spine of some ancient martian dinosaur jutting out of the ground I knew we were going to see some really great views. Wasn't disappointed either. Endurance was a great playground, with amazing views of the cliffs, clouds drifting across the sky above the crater, and Wopmay sitting there halfway into the crater, looking like some bizarre stone sculpture. I was really sorry when Oppy turned her back on that stone, and of all the rocks and boulders I've seen through the rovers' eyes I think Wopmay is the one I'd like to own, although 'McKay' sitting on top of Homeplate comes a very close second, thanks to Spirit.

But the arrival at Victoria has been the highlight so far. Not so much the view itself, which was pretty amazing, but the way here on UMSF we all walked alongside Oppy as she advanced towards it, scanning the horizon looking for the crater to appear... sighting Beacon, and 'debating' what it was and which side of the crater it was on... Then the arrival at the edge and our first view of the great buttresses of stone on the far side beyond the crater's floor, with those dust dunes at its centre... I could almost hear Oppy give a contented sigh, knowing she'd done her best, and could do no more.

I remember sitting here on that day, looking at that first "into Victoria" view and thinking that if Oppy died then, that very moment, she'd have shown me the Mars I've always seen in my mind. I had a very vivid vision of future martians going to Victoria - preserved as a martian National Park or Heritage site - and following the "Oppy Trail" around the crater's edge, much as they will do the "Spirit Trail" up and down Husband Hill then past Ultreya and on to Homeplate. I saw that crater open up in front of me in the days that followed and with each new picture it became clearer to me that Oppy had reached a place that will be seen by future martians - settlers and natives - as a very special place indeed. And standing next to Oppy on that first day, seeing the crater for the first time, I felt like one of the first people to enter Yosemite Valley and stare up at those towering granite cliffs and gushing, rainbow-framed waterfalls.

Going to be hard to beat that... smile.gif


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Guest_Oersted_*
post Jul 23 2007, 12:00 PM
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For me there is some poetic justice in the fact that, if this storm will be the end of Oppy, she succumbed to the Planet and not to some part that stopped working. An amazing victory for the engineers!
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