13 November 2014

On Sol 806, we at the USGS were off for Veteran’s Day, but Curiosity was still busy! The sol 806 plan had a pretty simple morning science block with a single Mastcam image of the target “Glendora” along with some Mastcam and Navcam atmospheric observations. After that, we used the arm to take close-up images of targets “Ricardo” and “Pelona,” and to brush off Ricardo in preparation for an overnight measurement of its composition using APXS. The afternoon science block was dedicated to some more atmospheric observations.

On sol 807, we did some Navcam cloud monitoring over Mount Sharp, and made some Mastcam observations of targets “Shoemaker”, Pelona, and Ricardo. After that, we drove toward “Pink Cliffs” and then took some Mastcam and Navcam of our surroundings to look for good locations for more contact science. Our expected downlink for sol 807 was limited, so we had to be careful about prioritizing which data came down first.

Of course, while sol 807 planning was happening, the Rosetta team (including several of our colleagues on Curiosity) was busy making history by landing on a comet! The pictures that the Philae lander is returning are just spectacular – congratulations to the European Space Agency!

In Curiosity’s sol 808 plan, we have some more Mastcam and Navcam atmospheric monitoring and dust-devil searches. There is also a Mastcam mosaic of “Pink Cliffs” and of targets “Rosamond” and “Fernando.” Then the arm will get a workout: MAHLI will take a picture of the ChemCam window and the REMS UV sensor, and then Curiosity will brush the dust off of the target Rosamond, followed by MAHLI images, and several APXS measurements, including an overnight integration.

Dates of planned rover activities described in these reports are subject to change due to a variety of factors related to the Martian environment, communication relays and rover status.