Sols 1523-1524: Investigating Sutton Island

On Sol 1521 Curiosity drove 11 m to the east, which set us up to investigate a darker-toned outcrop known as "Sutton Island," seen in the middle of the above Mastcam image. Today’s plan is focused on contact science to study the grain size, stratification, and chemistry of the "Sutton Island" outcrop. I was the GSTL today, and it was a busy day of planning! It took a while to find contact science targets that we could safely reach with the DRT, MAHLI and APXS. Eventually we found targets that would work, and we planned MAHLI and APXS on two distinct parts of the outcrop, including a DRT location on the top of the outcrop to analyze a clean brushed surface. We were also able to plan a MAHLI "dogs eye" mosaic to investigate the stratification at a target known as "Seawall." In addition to contact science, we planned ChemCam observations of the targets "Duck Harbor," "Islesford," and "Sutton Island," to look for changes in chemistry. Overnight, Curiosity will acquire APXS integrations on the two different contact science targets. Then on the second sol we’ll use all of the Mastcam filters to assess the spectral properties of this different outcrop. Later in the afternoon we’ll take a large Mastcam mosaic for geologic context, and Curiosity will perform a ChemCam calibration activity.

By Lauren Edgar

--Lauren is a Research Geologist at the USGS Astrogeology Science Center and a member of the MSL science team.

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.

Written by Lauren Edgar, Planetary Geologist at USGS Astrogeology Science Center