Post Conjunction: Santa Maria to Cape York, The Journey to 'Spirit Point' Options

[jvandriel]

Sol 2586.

The Navcam L0 View of the FORTY LICKS Crater.

Jan van Driel

[fredk]

Farewell Mercury cluster?
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...0M1.JPG?sol2588

[Tesheiner]

They are now 125m far away on the rear mirror, and we should be reaching the 29km mark in two driving sols.

Edit: ... or even one. Tomorrow's driving might put Opportunity next to the traffic sign. Fingers crossed.

This post has been edited by Tesheiner: May 6 2011, 04:25 PM

[Guest_Sunspot_*]

I hope JPL make an event out of hitting 30km its a milestone that will deserve wider recognition in my opinion. I've noticed the NASA twitter feed rarely talks about planetary missions.

[Phil Stooke]

Farewell Mercury cluster, hello weird circular features:




Phil

PS - Scott tweets 160 m today - not too shabby!

[Stu]

New pancams down = new drive direction panorama...



Hmmm... something bright and interesting on the horizon... Will have to see what it lines up with on Google Mars...

(larger version here: http://twitpic.com/4u8rj2/full )

[Tesheiner]

Saw that too. If I did my math correctly, it is heading at 102º so it might be this little fellow 450m away.

[ngunn]

I haven't done any maths, but I'm looking at a feature about 1200m away. It looks like a sizeable crater (around 70m diameter) quite badly eroded but with a surprising amount of bright stuff showing.

[Stu]

Pic, Nige?

[ngunn]

I don't do pics easily, but it's pretty prominent here: http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.p...st&id=24273

Just go 1200m slightly S of E from the Mercury cluster.

[Stu]

You're getting really good at this crater-spotting lark, Nigel...

I asked Ray Arvidson what it was:

"Yes it is off about 1 km at an azimuth of 102 deg from the current rover position."

Sounds like your crater.

Edit: Bit confused now... 1km / 102 deg from current position =

[Phil Stooke]

"1km / 102 deg from current position ="

Yes, but what about "about 1 km..."? The fresh-looking crater is 'about' 1 km away, just not exactly 1 km away. And that crater may be the true identity of 'Young Blocky' as well.

Phil

[CosmicRocker]

I've taken Stu's image and added a green arrow pointing to the crater that I think Nigel is talking about. It could be the bright patch we see near the horizon, but the bearing to it in Google Mars is 96 degrees. That's quite a bit off from the 102 degrees that Ray said it was. 102 degrees is also the bearing that Midnight Mars Browser gives for the bright patch.

I know the base HiRise images we are using in Google Mars for the route map are offset somewhat from Google's underlying frame of reference. I don't think an offset alone would cause errors in bearing, but if our map is rotated it could.

[Tesheiner]

I know the base HiRise images we are using in Google Mars for the route map are offset somewhat from Google's underlying frame of reference. I don't think an offset alone would cause errors in bearing, but if our map is rotated it could.

The offset is because I registered this latest package of HiRISE images to the previous one covering SM which was also offset in relation to the background. There was no rotation on it, except for the one already existing in the original picture on its map-projected form.

[ngunn]

the crater that I think Nigel is talking about

You're right, that was my guess, but it doesn't seem to square with the azimuth so now I just don't know. We had azimuth problems with Santa Maria as well did we not? It will be interesting to see how this resolves itself.