Posted on 02/24/2004 4:52:19 PM PST by Phil V.
Daily Updates - February 24, 2004
Spirit Status for sol 51 Making Ground posted Feb. 24, 2 pm PST
To inspire a morning "run" on sol 51, which ended at 3:15 p.m. Tuesday, PST, Spirit woke up to Vangelis’ "Chariots of Fire." The rover deployed its arm, took microscopic images of the soil in front of it and then proceeded toward its target, "Middle Ground." Spirit drove 30 meters (98.4 feet), breaking its own record for a single-sol traverse. Along the way, Spirit paused to image rocks on both sides of the drive path with its panoramic camera.
The auto-navigational software that drove the last 12 meters (39.4 feet) of the traverse to the "Middle Ground" target warned Spirit that the slope into the hollow that houses it was too steep (according to parameters set by rover engineers). Spirit then paced along the rim, looking for a safe way down. Unable to locate a secure path into the crater before the sol ended, Spirit ended up facing slightly west of north instead of northeast, as called for by the plan. This orientation will reduce the amount of data the rover can return (due to interference between the UHF antenna and items on the rover equipment deck), but it will be corrected in the coming sols.
As of today, Spirit has moved 183.25 meters (601.21 feet) and is now roughly 135 meters (442.91 feet) from its landing site, Columbia Memorial Station.
The intent for the next several sols will be to drive Spirit into "Middle Ground" and take a full panorama of the surrounding area to identify scientifically interesting rocks.
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Opportunity Status for sol 30 A Beautiful Grind posted Feb. 24, 11:15 am PST
On sol 30, which ended at 2:56 a.m. Tuesday, February 24, Opportunity performed its first rock abrasion tool operation on a rock target known as 'McKittrick Middle Rat' at the El Capitan site inside the crater. The tool shaved the rock over a period of two hours, grinding into a total depth of about 4 millimeters (.16 inches).
The auspicious day began with the song 'Rock'n Me' by Steve Miller and some miniature thermal emission spectrometer sky surveys and sky stares to study the atmosphere. After completing these activities, Opportunity took a short siesta to recharge its batteries. The rover has been doing a lot of science work at night, and the season on Mars is changing to winter, so the rover has less energy to work with than it did earlier in the mission. The martian days are getting shorter and the sun angle is not allowing either rover to power up the solar panels as much as in the past.
Opportunity woke up from its nap at 11:30 Local Solar Time on Mars to run through the series of commands required to retract the alpha particle X-ray spectrometer and close its doors; take several microscopic images of another nearby rock abrasion tool target called 'Guadalupe;' flip the wrist; take a microscopic image of "McKittrick Middle Rat;" and place the rock abrasion tool on its target to run at 13:00 Local Solar Time.
After the abrasion tool was retracted, a series of microscopic images of the scene were taken, and the alpha particle X-ray spectrometer was successfully placed into the abrasion tool's hole late in the day.
Some additional panoramic camera, miniature thermal emission spectrometer readings, and hazard avoidance camera imagery was completed through the day.
The plan for sol 31, which will end at 3:36 a.m. Wednesday, February 25, is to continue getting long Moessbauer readings of the rock abrasion tool hole and to prepare the tool for more work again on sol 33 or 34.
Rather unlikely, given that the taxes are 34¢/gal...
I'll post just a blow up without 3-d
Any way you can post some L-R shots for those without R/C glasses (like me)?
Oh, FWIW from my "naked eye" look at the R/C photo, it looks sort of like a gutted/skinned chicken, that's had the meat cut off (ribs, and open abdomen).
No, I'm not saying it's a chicken, so nobody get started on me, eh? <g>
PS: I've been rounding my my "conch" links, I will try to post them in the morning. Had a few rough(er than normal) days, had a "thing" cut out of my back, have to go back later to have a much bigger one cut out too. I've felt better.
PPS: looking over the "conch" photos, I see what look like possible addition al "conch-like" things, maybe broken pieces of "conch-like" things (i.e., the "hub" and so forth). I'm increasingly beginning to entertain the idea that these may very well be "conch-like" rather than "conch-appearing-like" things.
From the Mud on the 'magic carpet' could prove that there's life on Mars thread (my comment is in post 15 in that thread):
Note the "conch-like" thing lower-center. Since that was posted, I've found a better reproduction, it's been balanced to get rid of the red cast, and it's larger. The caveat is that I found it on a "tinfoilesque" site, but since it's just a plain ol' "corrected" photo (as I'd do myself if I had my image editor re-installed since The Crash), and I'm not going with any of the guy's "machinery in the rocks" nonsense, I don't feel any qualms about pointing to this photo:
Several other interesting things in that photo, IMO.
The same guy also found another "conch-like" thing, and put a comment of his own in the photo. (Maybe someone can find the Nasa original if they'd like.):
What he didn't spot is what looks like another eroded spiral shell, to the far left of the one in the photo. It's more eroded, but you can stll see the "hub", at about the 5:00 position, and the remains of the "core" of the spiral.
Here's a closeup he's got of the one he did see. The "hub" looks pretty obvious to me:
Here's one more, from The Mars "Thread" Thread.
In that picture, the item to the "southeast" of the big sphere in the lower-left of the picture looks like a tiny spiral-shell, looking down from the top (or up from the bottom), i.e., "hub" on top, and "chambers" surrounding it.
Maybe these spiral "things" with the obvious "hub" and "chamber" sections are "just rocks", but so many of them found in such a short period of time would seem like quite a coincidence to me.
And for the record, I am someone who has taken a very cynical view of the "rorschach kids" who see everything from rusty tanks (rocks) to "buildings on 'Twin Peaks" (jpeg artifacts) in the photos from Mars. I wince as I post this, fingers crossed that I won't be categorized as "one of them" (because I'm not!)
Half buried black clam
(From Aquascope|Facts|Black clam|More facts 1)
I've seen better pics of half-buried clams (heck, I've seen better examples with my own eyes) that showed the "soft tissue" better (the stuff that lines the insides of both shell halves), but this should give you an idea of what that picture reminds me of (as does the tiny one in the "grind" example from yesterday).
Aqueous environment? Yes, too much evidence of historical volcanism. Most of our terrestrial water was created during volcanic events.
Water or carbon dioxide? Again, probably a lot of juvenile water created by ancient volcanism, and this water was likely loaded with all sorts of goodies (like sulfur) that would be essential for life.
Clams? Sadly, Don Joe, I doubt it. I don't think there was time enough for higher animals to have evolved before Mars lost it's water.
Critters? I'm inclined to think we are looking at forams and bryozoa-like creatures (there, now I'm committed), which would make sense if Mars had shallow saline bodies of water.
As to what the NASA folks are thinking....yeesh......I imagine the staff paleontologists and geologists are engaged in rather "spirited" discussion, with geophysicists stacked against the pro-Martian life folks. We probably won't hear anything definitive for a while, and without seeing the data they have, all we can do is speculate.
Absolutely! I agree, and it will continue to increase until the cost affects the consumption. Free market in action.
$0.19 where it was when I started driving my own car?
$.19? I remember $.20. You must be older :-), But also taking account inflation, in constant dollar terms, gas was cheaper last year than it was in the last 30 or so.
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