Seems like a good time for a new thread.

Spirit should be on her way back to Home Plate fairly soon. To help plan this, back on sols 1081 and 1089 a long baseline anaglyph was taken in that direction, here is my attempt to put it together.




James

> Spirit should be on her way back to Home Plate fairly soon.

Perhaps she's on the move right now! The plan for tosol (1102) includes driving and taking a "post-drive" 180º navcam mosaic centered at 288º (looking back to Low Ridge).
I'm pretty convinced they won't move towards Tyrone so this could be the first move on the return to Home Plate.

Stay tuned.

Yes!

Spirit did a sort of U-Turn and is now positioned to drive (backwards, off course) towards Home Plate.

Rhaz: http://nasa.exploratorium.edu/mars/spirit/...HLP1312R0M1.JPG
Fhaz: http://nasa.exploratorium.edu/mars/spirit/...HLP1212R0M1.JPG

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Annotated navcam mosaic (sol 1096)

Added 2 images.

The L0 Navcam view from Sol 1096 and Sol 1098.

jvandriel

Loving the ripples in the dust as we head back to HP...

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Based on last jv pano:
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My attempt on the 360º navcam panorama (half-size) taken on sol 1103.

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FWIW, next driving sol is 1106.

My polar version of the newest pan.

Phil

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There are no images from this sol on today's downlink so obviously the plan has changed.

Perhaps tomorrow?

New update confirms drive back to Home Plate

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/status.html

Robin

Said it before... let me at those rocks!!!

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Stu, those are stunning - you've nailed that colour pretty much dead on. Those could've been press release images.

Ok, Spirit is on the move again.
Based on the last fhaz and rhaz images from sol 1107, I would place the rover here (see image).

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Thanks Fred, I was quite pleased with them. Think I'm getting better

Here's a view from a couple of days ago I completely forgot about...

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Here's the "post-drive" navcam mosaic (4x1) taken on sol 1107.
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Will Spirit drive over those old tracks on the way back to Home Plate?
Edited: Another question: At which point in HP do you think they will re-start the science campaign? North side, NE corner, East side?

Given a broken wheel - I'm really rather pleased with the length of that drive - should be back at HP fairly soon.

Doug

I think the tricky manouvers on five wheels are only those related to positioning the rover for IDD work.
Straight driving for "long" distances was already seen when Spirit drove back from Tyrone to the winter haven on sols 803 & 805.

Sorry if this has already been posted

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/07021...art_rovers.html

I didn't want to start a topic for it.

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/spirit/re...NUP1312L0M1.JPG

Looks like Spirit is enjoying herself - trying to build a sand castle

Pushing herself up against that mound - and a stone in her jammed wheel
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/spirit/fo...NUP1214L0M1.JPG

Just a bit of messing around while nursing a very sick dog (see avatar... ) Operation for her tomorrow, so have to do something to take my mind off it...

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Sorry to hear that. Beautiful collie is it. Sure hope she'll be fine.

Hmmm. That slab of stuff directly in front of us seems to have an open, porous surface. Could it be a third kind of laminar "sulfate rock" after the granular and non-granular layers we were studying back at King George Island? The sedimentary history around here is continuing to complicate.

Hi Stu hope all goes well with your dog (sorry I don't know his/her name.)

Shaka hello, those rocks do look new and so porous that they could almost be pumice.

I hope the stone in bad wheel doesn't make thing worse for Spirit.

Roy F

I get the impression from the latest Flight Director's report (Feb 15) that they're headed for Mitcheltree Ridge first, rather than Home Plate as we've heard to date.

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/mer/flightdir.cfm

Stu,
Let us know how things go with the operation.
Dogs are special companions.

Stu, I hope everything goes well.
Lhoba sents her best wishes.

Dogs...We can't live without them...

My impression is that they will spend the weekend analysing the rock right in front of the rover and then move directly to HP. If the current location is considered part of Mitcheltree Ridge or not is something I don't know.

Thanks for all the support guys re Amber's operation earlier today, I really appreciate it. Not embarrassed to admit I've been in pieces all day, ever since leaving Amber at the vet's first thing this morning. But happy to be able to report that our 14 year old collie made it through the kidney biopsy op, and is now sleeping off the anaesthetic in the vet's, on a drip, warm and safe under a sheepskin blanket. The op uncovered definite kidney damage, which the tests on the biopsy sample will hopefully show can be treated with appropriate medication/diet etc.

I love this dog to bits, not ashamed to admit it,though I know "non dog people" will find it hard to understand how something like this can get to you, but that's ok. She's been sitting or more usually sleeping by my side as I've sat here looking at MER pictures for the past 3 years. I actually use Amber in my school and public Outreach talks a lot, and often sneak her into pictures, just for the sake of it. This is one I use to see if anyone actually sees it and asks "Is that a real photo..?"

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Thanks again guys. I won't go on about this again.

Been backtracking a bit and hey, look where we were a year ago...

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Can't wait to get back amongst all those rocks! Shouldn't be long now...

The MER website has an updated status report from the 16th Feb.
Among other things, Spirit suffered a reboot and will be moving towards HP on sol 1104.

Here is the 360 degree panoramic view taken with

the L0 Navcam on Sol 1107 and Sol 1108.

jvandriel

The L7 Pancam view in the drive direction on Sol 1109.

jvandriel

Rocks getting more interesting the closer we get...

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Here is jvandriel's latest pan in polar form.

Phil

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Yeah, It's a shame she had to sit in the same place for so long. Spirit made the most of her captivity, but, though dragging a lame foot, she is now free.

Nothing on Exploratorium for the past two days--does anyone know if we have gotten any data from Spirit recently? Hopefully not another computer reset. Maybe she has just gone shopping for a new set of wheels, it's Presidents Day (An American tradition to buy stuff on this holiday, particularly cars).

Sol 1113 is finishing but I don't know if the evening downlink window was already done or not.
Truly the imaging plan for these weekend was very "light" but I would expect in that case some older images to get their way through the downlink pipeline.
I really hope there was no other reset; who knows. What I know is that tomorrowsol (1114) looks to be driving sol i.e. move towards Home Plate.
We will see.

Now that I think I've just about managed to get half-decent colours with my software, in advance of Spirit's triumphant, wounded-wheel dragging return to Homeplate, I've been going back over old images of the feature and seeing what I could do... looking forward to views like this again...

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I think the weekend observations were mostly with mini-TES, but usually there's some other data from the navcam during these sessions. If a drive is planned, then that must be a good sign all is well... I hope.

Today is a holiday in the USA? Nobody told me!

Nothing new, yet. Sol 1114 images should hit the exploratorium NET 20:30UTC.



Ahh, good old times when Spirit had all six wheels in good shape.

Yup, Exploratorium's downlinked a new batch this morning. Looks like some nice variety of rocks on Mitcheltree:
I wonder if the top-center rock is a meteorite or the very-vesiculated scoria we've seen? Bottom left is an eroded chunk in the suspicious shape of a coral head, but I suppose is related to the sulfate+ash rocks around here?
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/spirit/pa...NUP2456L7M1.JPG

And perhaps they are more interested in what appears to be a welded tuff:
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/spirit/pa...NUP2560L5M1.JPG

Like you said, nice variety of rocks...

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New set of images at Exploratorium.

Let's see if we may have at least two more driving days before the weekend so Spirit could be at Home Plate's east face soon. Given the current downlink times I'm afraid Spirit is on restricted sols.

Here is the rover current location (approximate) as seen from a navcam mosaic taken on sol 1103.
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Still playing about with carefully re-examining old Homeplate images, and now I really want to go back to this rock... I don't think they looked at it carefully enough last time.

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But I know, Spirit was in rather a rush...

Sol 1116 Navcam equirectangular:



(I don't have access to PTGui at the moment, so the stitch is not the best.)

Thanks, Michael.
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Vertical (2.5cm/pixel) and Pseudo-Polar - as usual.

Here's my version of mhoward's pan in polar form.

Phil

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Okay, Spirit is definitely writing grafitti in the dust now...

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First I thought you've touched the original image, then I said to myself: "No, it's really there! What's that!".
Then I realized those "scratches" were wheel marks...