Opportunity's Full Week of Driving Past Craters

It has been a week of driving for Opportunity. She drove on five of the last seven sols and covered over 400 meters (1,312 feet). As the rover makes her way toward Endeavour crater, she is taking a path that passes by a set of small impact craters for some drive-by imaging.

On Sols 2403 (Oct. 27, 2010), 2404 (Oct. 28, 2010), and 2405 (Oct. 29, 2010), Opportunity drove 129 meters (423 feet), 44 meters (144 feet) and 89 meters (292 feet), respectively in roughly an East/Southeast direction with some pre- and mid-drive imaging to capture some of the impact craters along the way.

Over the weekend, the rover performed an atmospheric argon measurement with the alpha particle X-ray spectrometer (APXS) and used the new autonomous exploration for gathering increased science (AEGIS) software to collect some autonomous science imaging.

On Sol 2409 (Nov. 2, 2010), Opportunity resumed driving, covering about 38 meters (125 feet) with some mid- and post-drive imaging.

Another drive on Sol 2410 (Nov. 4, 2010), had the rover going more than 100 meters (328 feet) with close drive-bys of more impact craters.

On the morning of Sol 2410 (Nov. 4, 2010), the rover woke early to catch an image of the transit of Phobos across the Martian sky with the Panoramic camera (Pancam).

As of Sol 2409 (Nov. 2, 2010), solar array energy production was 610 watt-hours with a slightly elevated atmospheric opacity (Tau) of 0.646 and a solar array dust factor of 0.678.

Total odometry is 24,813.42 meters (24.81 kilometers, or 15.42 miles).

Spirit Remains Silent at Troy
Spirit remains silent at her location on the west side of Home Plate. No communication has been received from the rover since Sol 2210 (March 22, 2010).

The project continues to listen for Spirit with the Deep Space Network and the Mars Odyssey orbiter for autonomous recovery communication from the low-power fault case.

The project is also conducting a paging technique called "sweep and beep" to stimulate the rover in the case of a mission-clock fault.

Improving solar insolation levels should provide an environment for the rover batteries to recharge with increasing likelihood of hearing from Spirit in the period ahead.

Total odometry is unchanged at 7,730.50 meters (4.80 miles).

-Mars Daily,

http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/Full_Week_Of_Driving_Past_Set_Of_Crater...