Mars Rover Opportunity Update: Energy Levels Expected to Rise (with photos)

Mars Rover Opportunity Update: Energy Levels Expected to Rise – sols 2887-2893, March 07-14, 2012:

Opportunity is positioned on the north end of Cape York on the rim of Endeavour Crater with an approximate 15-degree northerly tilt for favorable solar energy production.

Opportunity is passing through the period of minimum solar insolation. Although the winter solstice is still some weeks away, it is expected that energy levels will start to rise. Further, there has been some very small dust cleaning, slightly improving the dust factor of the solar arrays.

Radio Doppler tracking passes for the geo-dynamic investigations were performed on Sols 2890 and 2893 (March 11 and 14, 2012). Microscopic Imager mosaics were collected on Sol 2887 and 2889 (March 8 and 10, 2012). An atmospheric argon measurement with the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS) was taken on Sol 2888 (March 9, 2012). A low-light Panoramic Camera (Pancam) image was also collected this Sol and Panoramic Camera images of “Morris Hill” were taken on Sol 2892 (March 13, 2012). The Mossbauer spectrometer was otherwise placed down on the surface target Amboy collecting further integration time.

As of Sol 2893 (March 14, 2012), solar array energy production was 301 watt-hours with an atmospheric opacity (Tau) of 0.542 and a solar array dust factor of 0.489.

Total odometry is unchanged at 21.35 miles (34,361.37 meters).