The Sol 26 drive was successful, and the images taken afterwards revealed interesting outcrops in front of the rover. The focus of the Sol 27 plan is primarily the first sampling of Mars’ atmosphere by the SAM instrument, leaving little time for additional tasks. With ChemCam back in operation, the top priority is to obtain better observations of its calibration target. Initially, 77 minutes were allocated for this task, but upon discovering a new outcrop target, the science team wanted to take pictures and use ChemCam’s laser on it.
Steve Squyres, the Mineralogy Science Theme Group Lead for the day, approached the Tactical Uplink Lead, Pauline Hwang, to request additional time for scientific observations. Pauline, having previously worked on the Mars Exploration Rovers, approved an additional 40 minutes for the science team. Mastcam and ChemCam observations of the outcrop were then included in the plan to be sent to MSL.
Although not scheduled in a tactical role for the day, the excitement of MSL mission operations drew me to spend most of the day at JPL. This allowed me to catch up on various tasks, including processing new MARDI images to determine optimal compression levels for geologic interpretation. Additionally, I reviewed older ChemCam RMI images taken in the MSL testbed to experiment with image compression techniques. This analysis is crucial to maximize the use of data received from MSL via the Mars orbiters. By completing these tasks promptly, we can ensure efficient data utilization in future operations.