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by Staff Writers Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 10, 2014
Opportunity is on the west rim of Endeavour Crater heading towards 'Marathon Valley,' a putative location for abundant clay minerals less than a mile (about a kilometer) to the south. The rover is stopped at an interesting geologic unit and conducting in-situ (contact) measurements. On Sol 3853 (Nov. 25, 2014), the rover used the robotic arm to reposition the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS) for a surface measurement. On the next sol, the Rock Abrasion Tool (RAT) was used to brush a new surface target, which was then imaged with the Microscopic Imager (MI) and examined with the APXS. With the Thanksgiving holiday, a multi-sol plan was built to collect Pancam images over the long holiday weekend. However, the rover experienced amnesia events and then a computer reset around Sol 3856 (Nov. 28, 2014). After the reboot, the rover was no longer under sequence control and was unable to mount the flash (non-volatile) memory. The project restored the rover to normal sequence operation on Sol 3859 (Dec. 1, 2014), but the flash file system remained unavailable. The project prepared for a reformatting of the flash memory on Sol 3862 (Dec. 4, 2014). As of Sol 3859 (Dec. 1, 2014), solar-array energy production was 468 watt-hours, with an atmospheric opacity (Tau) of 1.376 and a solar-array dust factor of 0.638. Total odometry as of Sol 3861 (Dec. 3, 2014) is 25.66 miles (41.30 kilometers).
Related Links Mars Exploration Rovers Mars News and Information at MarsDaily.com Lunar Dreams and more
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