[X] My Assistant

[MahFL]

Would these robot-made craters be safe to approach and have scientific value for MSL's instruments?

They said they would, tungsten is pretty inert. The impacts are quite far away though, and not in the direction they want to head.

[akuo]

Phyllosilicates may be located between points 16 and 19 according to CRISM hyperspectral observations and Ryan Anderson paper.

Since the rover will be basicly standing down for the next 4 sols, should we have a thread about the future plans? Is the longer term plan to basicly drive towards the hills between 16 and 19 in neo56's image? What would be the path taken? Going towards 23 and then taking the less dune-filled route towards the mountain?

Before this all the instrument checkouts need obviously to be completed and some local science performed.

neo56's image repeated below

[Pando]

The best yet! Here it is with exaggerated topography. The dunes clearly reach up the lower slopes of Mt. Sharp.

Yes! The first (I think) Phil-o-Vision image from MSL images. Very nice!

[stewjack]

Does anyone know what the vertical exaggeration is on the HiRise anaglyphs ?

I haven't been able to find that information. This page claims to have a link to a PDF "About anaglyph products" but I keep getting a file corrupted warning when In try and open it.

Jack

[dvandorn]

Since the rover will be basicly standing down for the next 4 sols, should we have a thread about the future plans? Is the longer term plan to basicly drive towards the hills between 16 and 19 in neo56's image? What would be the path taken? Going towards 23 and then taking the less dune-filled route towards the mountain?

That's exactly what the MSL science operations group will, I am sure, be deciding over the next days and weeks. I imagine they will first start making decisions about where in the near area they will drive (if anywhere) to check out the rest of the systems, sensors and probes, and then they will unveil a plan for the next few months. I'd guess they'll lay out a traverse plan that will get them to the flanks of Mt. Sharp and do a lot of drive-by science on the way.

But while we can speculate and guess what they'll come up with, we won't know anything, I'm sure, until they do their studies of the area and decide on next steps.

-the other Doug

[RoverDriver]

That's exactly what the MSL science operations group will, I am sure, be deciding over the next days and weeks. I imagine they will first start making decisions about where in the near area they will drive (if anywhere) to check out the rest of the systems, sensors and probes, and then they will unveil a plan for the next few months. I'd guess they'll lay out a traverse plan that will get them to the flanks of Mt. Sharp and do a lot of drive-by science on the way.

But while we can speculate and guess what they'll come up with, we won't know anything, I'm sure, until they do their studies of the area and decide on next steps.

-the other Doug

I don't think it is appropriate for me to say anything about the science plan, of which I know very little yet, but it will take a few sols still to check out our new vehicle, kick the tires, go for a test drive. Fortunately there are no sales droids on Mars. Pouring over these first few NAVCAMs seeing for the first time all the features I carefully looked at for years on HiRISE makes me really impatient to see what's behind all the corners. I can almost feel the dirt between my toes.

Paolo

[Richard Lee]

Anyone know where to obtain the KML for the EDL in Google Mars that they showed at the press conference today?

[dvandorn]

Bjorn's excellent colorization of the navcam pan highlights a very valuable aspect of the color imagery.

The descent plume pits show a distinctly gray layer of material that has been excavated and overlies the otherwise reddish fines. The material seems to have been excavated from very near the bottoms of the pits, as it begins to appear on the pit wall very nearly from the bottom, and it barely clears the outside wall of the mound. The gray ejecta only appears on the "outboard" sides of the pits, those facing away from the rover and in the direction of the angled engine plumes.

And in all but one of the pits the material at the bottom looks reddish, not gray. I thought that was very noticeable even in the thumbnail pan, and it looks even more obvious in this great colorization.

I'm certainly open to the concept that the gray fines were originally reddish and have been turned gray by some interaction with the rocket exhaust, but this looks for all the world like there is a discrete gray layer in this regolith that is sandwiched between layers of reddish fines.

Interesting.

Of course, the full-resolution images of the pits will be more instructional, I'm sure. But even at this point, with a combination of color data and high-resolution B&W images and not even waiting for the full res mastcams, we're seeing some really interesting things, here.

-the other Doug

[SteveM]

after seeing the constellation of impacts from the tungsten ballast[/url], I was wondering how deep a crater each 25kg mass made impacting the surface at over 1,000 m/s? Would these robot-made craters be safe to approach and have scientific value for MSL's instruments?

It might be worthwhile to get CRISM spectra while the craters are still fresh, perhaps in one of the next MRO passes. Six separate craters should provide a pretty good sample of the subsoil.

[Tailspin45]

Haven't seen any mention here--and I've read every post--but has anyone pondered the risk of the chute blowing around, worse case over Curiosity? I found several articles that conclude the prevailing winds are from the NNW and occasionally the south, so it doesn't seem to be a serious threat if my geography/geometry is right. But that sure is a big sucker, and the winds they do blow. Or am I just imagining a boogie-man?

[elakdawalla]

Remember the Martian air pressure. It's not possible (Rob Manning has assured me) for the parachute to inflate again, much less to blow around with the aero shell still attached.

[dvandorn]

Haven't seen any mention here--and I've read every post--but has anyone pondered the risk of the chute blowing around, worse case over Curiosity?

I don't believe the 7-millibar atmospheric pressure is enough to move that chute once it's laid out on the ground. The chutes from the MER rovers were observed off and on from when they first draped themselves over the ground, and neither did more than ripple slightly, if that.

Now, they won't drive Curiosity anywhere near the 'chute, but not because they're afraid the chute will blow on top of her. Rather, it's for the same reason they wouldn't drive Spirit or Oppy to their 'chutes -- if you drive just a little too far in the wrong direction, you could get your wheels tangled in the riser cords, and not even a nuclear-powered rover has wheel motors strong enough to drive itself and also drag a parachute and backshell along after it...

-the other Doug

EDIT -- Emily beat me to it. Sorry to be repetitive, there. dvd

[CosmicRocker]

... Does anyone know what the vertical exaggeration is on the HiRise anaglyphs ?

I haven't been able to find that information. This page claims to have a link to a PDF "About anaglyph products" but I keep getting a file corrupted warning when In try and open it.

You could read an old discussion about HiRISE where anaglyph vertical exaggeration was discussed. You can find an Excel spreadsheet download I made that can take HiRISE image info and calculate the vertical exaggeration for any stereo pair. You can use the defaults, or input the distance between your pupils and the distance between your eyes and your screen.

[fredk]

Is this showing the same drop-off? Any opinions?

I think the navcam dropoff is pretty close - check out my identifications in my post here.

[Joffan]

The EDL team's claim from the Sol 5 briefing (25:00) is that the first Hazcam images were actually timed with the possibility in mind of catching the descent stage crash cloud. Amazing!