By 
July 16th, 2020
Curiosity Left B Navigation Camera photo taken on Sol 2822, July 14, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is now performing Sol 2824 tasks.
“Curiosity continues its cross-country trek today, looking for our next drill site,” reports Sean Czarnecki, a planetary geologist at Arizona State University in Tempe.
Mars Hand Lens Imager photo produced on Sol 2822, July 14, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
A recently drawn up plan includes a long drive that should put the rover within view of potential drill targets.
Curiosity Left B Navigation Camera photo acquired on Sol 2823, July 15, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Clay-rich rocks
“It is hoped that the region we are driving to will be a good opportunity to sample the clay-rich rocks of Glen Torridon one last time,” Czarnecki adds. “Of course we are still filling in some science observations around the long drive.”
Curiosity Front Hazard Avoidance Camera Right B image taken on Sol 2823, July 15, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Before driving, the plan calls for Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) observations of targets “Tollcross” and “Sasainn” as well as a Mastcam image mosaic of target “Thirl Moor.”
Curiosity Chemistry & Camera Remote Micro Imager (RMI) photo acquired on Sol 2823, July 14, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL
Curiosity Chemistry & Camera Remote Micro Imager (RMI) photo acquired on Sol 2823, July 15, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera photo taken on Sol 2823, July 15, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Clouds and dust devils
“After the long drive, we will have untargeted ChemCam observations of two additional targets,” Czarnecki notes, a Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons (DAN) active measurement, and the robot’s Navcam will look for clouds and dust devils.
DAN, Rover Environmental Monitoring Station (REMS) and Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD) will work overtime making environmental observations before, during, and after the drive, Czarnecki concludes.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
New road map
This map shows the route driven by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity through the 2822 Martian day, or sol, of the rover’s mission on Mars (July 15, 2020).
Numbering of the dots along the line indicate the sol number of each drive. North is up. The scale bar is 1 kilometer (~0.62 mile).
From Sol 2820 to Sol 2822, Curiosity had driven a straight line distance of about 7.26 feet (2.21 meters), bringing the rover’s total odometry for the mission to 14.27 miles (22.96 kilometers).
The base image from the map is from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment Camera (HiRISE) in NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
Posted in Space News
