Sols 4056-4058 Blog: "Ringing" in a New Year

Sols 4056-4058 Blog: “Ringing” in a New Year

by Scott VanBommel, Planetary Scientist at Washington University

Pasadena CA (JPL) Jan 04, 2024

Earth planning date: Tuesday, January 2, 2024: Curiosity was busy over the holiday break, working independently through 11 pre-planned sols. As Earth transitioned into a new year, dawn broke once again on Mars, and Curiosity awaited a call in the form of a fresh set of instructions. The return to planning for Curiosity’s science team today was not immune to plot twists and suspense.

While the planned drive at the end of the holiday plan came up a little bit short, the operations team received word as we were finalizing the plan’s activities that our intended connection through the Deep Space Network (DSN) would not be viable due to an issue with the DSN.

Curiosity’s team pivoted swiftly, converting the three-sol plan into a two-sol plan with the intention of relaying commands via a satellite orbiting Mars on what would have been the

first sol of the original plan.

Representing APXS tosol, I was waiting for the ball to drop as to whether or not this plan change would include APXS. In the end, however, the team was able to secure another path through the DSN to transmit Curiosity’s commands. As a result, the original three-sol plan was preserved, and Curiosity was set to receive its first “call” from Earth this year as originally planned.

The three-sol plan focused on removing dust from the surface of a rock face in two locations, “Wanda Lake” and “Green Pass” (located on the bright-looking flattish part of the rock to the left of center in the image), before capturing images with MAHLI and conducting geochemical analyses with APXS on each spot.

Curiosity also utilized ChemCam to analyze the targets “Chimney Lake” and “Onion Valley.” Targets imaged in the plan included “Isosceles Peak” and “Texoli” by ChemCam and “Sawtooth Peak” and “Onion Valley” by Mastcam. A monthly SAM checkout and a short ~6 m drive rounded out the main activities in the plan.