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Sols 4273-4274: Prep Rally

A close-up, overhead photo of a part of the Curiosity rover shows an enclosure that looks like a backwards “C.” Inside that is a circular, silver metal opening that looks like the wall of a springform cake pan, and inside that is a round opening that looks like a metal duct pipe, the inside of which is dark and you can’t see the bottom. The metal parts appear shiny and clean, but everything else in the image appears covered in brownish-orange dust.
This image from NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity shows the open inlet No. 2 on the rover’s SAM (Sample Analysis at Mars) instrument suite, where Curiosity delivered a sample from the “Kings Canyon” drill hole, for study using SAM’s Evolved Gas Analysis (EGA) mode. This image was taken by Mastcam Right (Mast Camera) aboard Curiosity on sol 4270 — Martian day 4,270 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission — on Aug. 10, 2024 (at 14:16:21 UTC).
NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Earth planning date: Monday, Aug. 12, 2024

The SAM EGA over the weekend was successful, and that means we’re well on our way to planning the GCMS (Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometry) on our “Kings Canyon” drill sample! GCMS is an energy-intensive activity, so we’ll be using today’s two-sol plan mainly for recharging our battery and prepping SAM by cleaning its GC column with high temperatures (like you’d clean your own oven!). We can still afford about 75 minutes of remote sensing over both sols this plan and are using it for our usual ChemCam, Mastcam, and Navcam activities.

On the first sol, ChemCam is kicking things off with a LIBS (Laser Induced Breakdown Spectrometer) on “The Major General” — some crunchy light-toned bedrock about 9 feet away (about 2.8 meters) — then will capture a long-distance 10-frame RMI of the Gediz Vallis channel floor to the south. Mastcam finishes off the first sol’s 72-minute science block with an M100 image of The Major General LIBS spots and a 68-frame stereo mosaic of the midfield terrain to fill in what’s left of the midfield with M100. We’ll nap until about 15:15 local Mars time, when we'll wake back up to take just two M100 images near the RSM hardstop at the same timing as a previous mosaic to make sure we have continuous coverage across the hardstop. SAM’s GC column clean is planned between 21:00 and 01:00; overnight between our two sols.

On the second sol, we’ll have our second remote sensing block around 11:00 for 73 minutes. ChemCam is planning a second LIBS target on “Dewey Point” — a slab of light-toned bedrock about 13 feet away (about 3.9 meters) — a passive-spectrum observation of a dark float block named “Waller Minaret,” and another long-distance four-frame RMI of southern Kukenan butte to the southeast. Mastcam has just a single M100 image of Dewey Point’s LIBS spots this sol so that Navcam can complete some environmental movies to hopefully capture some dust devils and maybe even some clouds!

Written by Natalie Moore, Mission Operations Specialist at Malin Space Science Systems

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Last Updated
Aug 14, 2024
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NASA Science Editorial Team

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A grayscale landscape photo from Mars, showing a broad, medium gray, rock-strewn plain in the foreground extending far into the distance, surrounded by several hills. The closest hill, in the lower right corner, rises up toward the side of the frame, and is darker than the floor below. A little farther out, on the left, a gentle slope rises from the low middle of the frame to middle of the left side; it’s about the same color as the valley floor, except for a band at its farthest edge, which darkens abruptly as if covered in shadow. The terrain appears softer than the ground below, more sandy than rocky. Beyond that along the same rising plane is a much lighter area, with scattered tiny peaks that are darker – looking like the top of a baked meringue pie. The channel floor runs between these hills, then appears to curve toward the right, behind the first hill and in front of the second. Finally, one other rounded peak appears above the horizon, behind these other two hills in the lower right of the frame, all of this below a light-gray sky filling more than half of the frame above.
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