NASA Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity Status 21 April 2006

OPPORTUNITY UPDATE: Making Progress Toward ‘Victoria’ – sol 789-797, Apr 21, 2006:

Opportunity is healthy and making good progress towards “Victoria Crater.” The rover remains on a restricted schedule, driving only every other day. Last weekend, the rover stopped for some brief robotic arm work, to characterize the outcrop between “Erebus Crater” and Victoria Crater. Next week Opportunity is back to a normal schedule, and engineers hope to get the rover moving every day.

Sol-by-sol summaries:

Sol 789 (April 13, 2006): The plan was to drive to outcrop about 26 meters (85 feet) away. However, the drive stopped about 10 meters (33 feet) short by a slip check.

Sol 790: Opportunity conducted untargeted remote science.

Sol 791: The rover did some robotic arm work including: taking microscopic images and using the rock abrasion tool brush. The rover attempted a short alpha particle X-ray spectrometer integration; however it failed due to a sequencing error.

Sol 792: Opportunity drove about 35 meters (115 feet) over an outcrop and crossed a few ripples.

Sol 793: The rover conducted untargeted remote science.

Sol 794: Opportunity drove about 30 meters (98 feet) towards Victoria Crater.

Sol 795: The rover conducted untargeted remote science.

Sol 796: After taking pre-drive images of the target “Fort Leavenworth,” the team plans to drive about 27 meters (86 feet) down a trough, with ripple crossings at the start and end.

Sol 797 (April 21, 2006): Opportunity did untargeted remote sensing, systematic ground surveys with the panoramic camera and miniature thermal emission spectrometer.

As of 794, Opportunity’s total odometry was 7,334.56 meters (4.56 miles).