The Descent into Victoria, Possible and Actual Strategies Options

[BrianL]

That "ripple" looks a bit, um, big, dontcha think..?

Nah, if you're really motivated to get to the other side, just keep those wheels churning till you break through it. I don't think it's deep enough to hang her up on her belly.

Just

Brian

[Tesheiner]

I was wondering why they hadn't made any further progress towards entering the crater lately.

I thought the low activity was due to the US holidays.
It wasn't until this morning that I knew about the press release and the issues with high tau / low power.

[Tesheiner]

Have a look to these two fhazcam images.
The first one was taken on sol 1216 at 12:44 right after moving on this site, while the second one is from yestersol, sol 1223 at 11:21. The local times are not exactly the same but quite similar and the shadows seen on the first one almost disappeared on the second picture.

[Guest_Sunspot_*]

This could be the end of Opportunity.

[djellison]

We're at a low of 400whrs (175 more than Spirit at its worst), with the atmospheric opacity improving. Reports of death are premature.

But - any sol could be the end of Opportunity to be honest. I don't think this dust storm makes it any more or less likely.

Doug

[fredk]

Thanks for that, Tesheiner. I made an animated gif with this 1217 frame and this 1223 frame. They are only 9 minutes apart in local time, and you can just make out the shadow of the right wheel in the 1223 view, but the shadow of the deck is almost invisible. This really gives you a good sense of how dusty the sky must be. Note that the arm has moved between these frames.

[helvick]

Reports of impending doom are definitely premature - the Dust storm is clearing so power levels should climb back up into the 600+ range over the next few weeks so long as there are no more storms.

I was very interested to see that my model of the amount of diffuse insolation noticably underestimates the amount of power available when Tau really rises to high numbers - at the stated Tau=3.3 and the current dust loss of 16% my model predicted 360Whr vs the 402Whr that Pando reported.

Assuming that 12% error holds for higher Tau values then Tau would have to rise past 5 and stay there for Opportunity to be in real trouble.

[Guest_Analyst_*]

I was very interested to see that my model of the amount of diffuse insolation noticably underestimates the amount of power available when Tau really rises to high numbers - at the stated Tau=3.3 and the current dust loss of 16% my model predicted 360Whr vs the 402Whr that Pando reported.

Nice dust storm to calibrate the model.

[Guest_Sunspot_*]

They should try and get some sunset/sunrise pictures, could be very colourful?

[Pando]

...at the stated Tau=3.3 and the current dust loss of 16% my model predicted 360Whr vs the 402Whr that Pando reported.

That was actually from the press release that Tom Tamlyn posted earlier

[nprev]

Man... ...what a change in such a short time! I wonder if the dust cloud had a discernible edge as seen from the ground. This is one of the most Earth-like changes we've seen on Mars, IMHO.

[mhoward]

Some Pancam images were taken on sol 1224, no doubt to study the sky during the dust storm. Of course brightness levels of these stretched JPGs are all over the place, but I think it does look dusty. The time was about 3:20 local Mars time.

[Bill Harris]

Interesting animation, Fredk. It is also instructive to make an animation of those two images adjusting the levels of the sunlit areas to be similar in addition to the shadow areas being similar as done previously. The on-the-ground effect is that the shadows appear markedly brighter with increased dust.

Rather the difference between LosAngeles and Palm Springs

--Bill

[CosmicRocker]

The dust seems to have softened the light, making the pancam 1x4 appear prettier than normal on sol 1224. I was waiting for Mike to update the metadata so I could use anti-vignetted images from MMB, but it seems I couldn't fully compensate for the brightness variation between images. I didn't screw with the color balance, because I liked the false color in this set. If someone can correct the brightness banding, this set of pancams will make a gorgeous postcard.

[Stu]

You're right Cosmic, lovely subtle light here at the moment...