Tiger cannot hit a ball 800 meters.

The surface looks firm, but I wonder about the dip and dune at the edge of the crater.....they may not be going up to the edge here for a quick peak at the bay and instead may go to one of the capes.

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...EKP1212L0M1.JPG

Here's a little movie of the approach to Victoria so far. Funny how it looks much like one of Pando's or Ant's simulations, but this is the real deal.

I bet he could in Mars gravity

I think the soil here looks awfully similar to the soil around Jammerbugt, the rover trap:
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/all...5TP1211L0M1.JPG

And with that suspect ripple right in front of us, I wouldn't risk driving any further...

quick remaping

on top-left moc view
on top-right remapped panorama
on botton-left orignal panorama

you can recognize the various structures of dunes

Click to view attachment


I will try to do something more clean

1/3rd G and <1% drag....Tiger could clear it with a 5 iron

Doug

I'd be cautious, too. There is a change in wind velocity at the rim with actively eroding evaporite on the cliff and in the crater. Fluffy, loose material is likely being deposited here. It is Jammerbugt-like.

--Bill

Maybe Victoria Crater deserves some golf artwork à la Loyal Chapman's Infamous Golf Holes

i don't like this crater
who goes in won't come out

The slope to the right of Oppy seems to be a a good entry point right down onto the huge rock sitting onthe slope of the crater wall.

The Plan for tomorrow's drive from the JPL image post.

"The position at the end of the sol 951 drive is about six meters from the lip of an alcove called "Duck Bay." The rover team planned a drive for sol 952 that would move a few more meters forward, plus more imaging of the near and far walls of the crater."

A drive to one of the Capes and the super panorama will presumably come some sols later. For the winner in the Victoria Arrival Sweepstakes, I would bet on 958 Airbag.

Floyd

Dave Seal mentions Victoria Crater in his latest "glog" entry.

and also of very low air density with 16th part of Earth. The ball, using the grunt feelings, would easily fall over than 1,300 meters. I have not yet get out the ballistic calculations on that unless I spend some time to look for physics manuals.

Rodolfo

P.D.
I think that a good golpher can hit the ball over than 600 meters in our breathable atmosphere.

Crikey! It's hard to keep up with this,.... especially if one is unfortunate enought to have to go to work (and one's work is not at JPL)...

Fredk,

I think you're right. That bumpy feature on the right of that image is probably Duck Crater

The oribital photo map shows the entrance to Duck Bay has a wider light coloured band across the top of it, more so than the other "bays" around the rim. Looks like 2 changes in slope angle - one at the top on leaving the Annulus to enter Duck Bay, and another further down where there is a transition to the main slope of the crater interior. I don't see this bright band being as prominent or as wide on any other bay, although each bay's rim is marked by a light toned line.

Maybe we'll see into Duck Bay's slopes "tomosol"....

Kenny

Yes, I agree it. the border rim of sand is very flufy. I recommend that Oppy won't approach on that direction toward the bay but to any of cape which have a firmer land. This would be the first step and from these site, there will be a much perspective to study better the soil conditions before to approach it.

Rodolfo

Oh oh oh. Be care Alex! N° is called "Victoria Fall" : I don't like it

I have realized it much before arriving it.

From the surface up to few meters below of rims is covered by sand and they have greater slope that Oppy won't be able to advance and will stay like another purgatory sand.

So, I am afraid, that there is only ones good bays on the north face which has more outcrops or fewer sand that Oppy can go down to RAT on any outcrop or do some IDD works. But she will never be able to go to the bottom unless if she wants to stay on crater bottom for forever. I would rather choice to visit for a Big Craters to the East and South East.

Rodolfo

Maybe not but since the Earth record drive is 720yards it seems to me that it should be possible to drive a ball more than 800m on Mars.

This enlace goes to other topic.

New Horizons Spies Jupiter[/s]

Sep. 27, 2006 | 11:08 PDT | 18:08 UTC
RSS 2.0 News Feed
Weblog Archive

by David Seal
...

Rodolfo
P.S. Please never mind it. The recent MER article is 2 pages down of the above URL. Apologies that it might have made confusions.

<clink> <clink> (hope you accept € )
I'm coming home right now. Yesterday, when pictures arrived I had the feeling I was alone at the forum but I must say, it's no longer the case now
So I had to read AAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLL the posts and open AAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLL the pictures.
Here are some remarks.
1- We've got this lip in front of us that is very similar to what would happen on Earth to a crest were wind would have blown snow. I don't know about sand but, I suspect there's quite some wind there. Would be good for solar panel but not so much for the optics, be care Oppy, we need your eyes
2- There's a lot of dicussions about entering Victoria. On top of all the reasons you've talked about like energy, slipage, % of the slope I can see another one : interest. If the entry ramp goes in the middle of the sand it has less interest than going to a rock that had fallen, not talking about a cliffs. I'm going to open up a new thread about entering in Victoria, where we could discuss both of % of slopes but also post again the studies and the videos we have at the time when such considerations were done back at Endurance. I think it could be handy to have them again close to us.

Again, I can't live anymore without your pictures. Thanks all.

Using a number of 80m/sec for a Tiger woods drive (rather than the world record that I mentioned above) and doing some very approximate drag and lift calculations I get a range of ~620m for a Tiger Woods T-shot on Mars. The low density of the martian atmosphere is actually a slight problem - the ball isn't travelling fast enough to generate positive lift so it follows a path that is much closer to ballistic than it does on Earth. Pretty mean drive all the same.

Anyone else intrigued by the thin white layer that cross cuts the crater near the top of the stratigraphic column?

Yeah, a couple of people (here and here).

If I correctly matched a point in the current navcam image with a corresponding point in the route map image (probable), the range to that point from the current position per the route map is 320 meters, and elevation (if we trust the rover orientation quaternion) is -12.7 degrees (with a potential error of +/- 1.5 degrees), then a bit of trigonometry suggests a depth (from the current position) of 72 +/-8 meters. My target was a point (intersection of dunes) in the northwest quadrant of the dune field.

[edit]The rover position I used was that shown as Sol 950 in the current route map, however the navcam images I used were dated Sol 951. Assuming that Oppy has driven 10-20 meters forward, the correct depth may be a few meters less (perhaps 5 or less).

Actually I think he could - on Mars!

(Edit: Somebody already gave that reply, I was in Exploratorium and other places for comments - sorry!)

Regardless, no clink in this end as of yet. But thank you Doug for the funny idea - Im just
awed here. *Cheers*

Wonderful work, everyone. This thread made me buy a bigger hard drive, but this thread is going to make me buy a bigger monitor, or two. I am beginning to think the "UM" in UMSF stands for Upgrade Me....

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/pre.../20060927b.html


Look at the detail -I meant to see some layering in the nearby cliff from the jpeg's but now I'm sure

Nico

The question that most intrigues me at this point is whether the bottom of any of the exposed rock outcrops is deeper than the deepest point examined in Endurance. The depth of the sandy bottom of the crater, while interesting from a curiosity perspective, will have much less impact on scientific analyses than the depth of the lowest accessible rock outcroppings. Any thoughts on this?

Yes, deeper in the stratigraphic column.

This look right?

Nico

Probably lines caused by erosion, indicating previous surface contact of the slope...

Does the dark outcrop have layers or fractures? One can see banding at a 45 degree angle. Are these bands caused by the shock of crater formation? Will a better view show horizontal layers as well?

Ah, thanks Pando. The inclination had me puzzled somewhat.

Nico

I was looking at those too. I'm not sure if I see a trend where you've drawn your shorter line. Certainly I see a trend associated with the longer of the two lines. They DO seem coincidentally parallel to the slope of the bay. Slope retreat may be one explanation. I also wondered if it might be related to fracturing associated with the impact.

I'm trying to figure out were's Oppy now in oder to understand how far is Cabo Frio.
What I did, was to take James map, a ruler and mesure on my screen the distance from Cabo Frio to Cape Verde. I mean, the shorter distance.
I need you verify this since I can believe it, I've found 140 meters!!!
So, in case we're sitting in the middle of Duck Bay, the very nice view we have of Cabo Frio vertical cliffs are from some 70 meters away.
For the ones that didn't have the impression Victoria was big!

Dilo came up with an explanation yesterday. We were talking about the fine white line on the far rim and here is what he said :
"I was making the same considerations about the horizontal line, now so bright. This clear discontinuity is clearly made of a completely different stuff and I start to understand why capes abruptly ends when intersecating it.
I think terrain is much less cohesive below this layer, so terrain tends to slide under action of gravity in absence of other material around it. Probably, immediately after VC formation, rim was pretty circular but then started to be eroded in correspondance of bays. First colapsed leaving the big chunk, then aeolian erosion did the work producing boulders and, at the end, sand.
What do you think?"

I agree on the softer soil underneath; so, what you show us ,Pando, could be a Cape that colapse AND rotate "noze" first. There are other capes on the far rim that did the same, including one that look have to ended up verticaly. It's called E1-E2
Edited with picture :
Click to view attachment

Yes Nix, I saw those angled planes in the rock face. Impact shock structures is my guess. However it would have to be followed by instaneous flash "welding" of the cracks, as part of the impact process? Otherwise presumably the rock would cleave along those beds and the upper parts would collapse off ?

Kenny

Boy, there sure does seem to be a lot of mass wasting as well as possibly some significant undercutting along the upper rim. Exactly how close are they planning to take Oppy to the edge?

Thanks for posting the Right stereo image for your panorama, Nico. I can see clearly for miles and miles!!

Well I've been looking in stereophotomaker and I just KEEP looking at it, and other pans.

There's just so much to see here. What a joy it will be to get 3-filter mosaics soon...

Nico

I did some simulations just to try to comprehend the sheer size of this thing. Check this out.

The Great Pyramid of Giza fits comfortably into the crater's dune field. Here is a 3-d simulation:
Click to view attachmentClick to view attachment

Here is how it would look from Oppy's eyes:
Click to view attachment

And here are some Earthly comparison images. Observe the road, cars (if you can), and the size of buildings in relation to the pyramid:



Stats:
Victoria Crater: 730m wide, 70m deep
Great Pyramid of Giza: 231m per side, 138m high

There's really no words to describe what we're seeing here.

très cool, Mr Pando, great comparison

Nico

Thanks, Pando. Now I have to go print out and construct Doug's Victoria coin jar, and pay up for the expletives I said in awe on seeing your simulation. And I was doing so well...

P.S. I hope JPL puts something like that online.

My first thought (or hope) was that these were overturned beds from the impact, but on the left face of the bluff we see a blocky, horizontal bedform. This intuitively suggests to me that this block is more or less horizontal and not overturned or tilted. The fractures we see look like the joints we've seen in the evaporite at Erebus and Endurance and on the exposed bedrock. We'll know more with a closer look.

--Bill

Hope a few people like this... not as realistic as others will be, I'm sure, this is how I'm seeing Victoria in my mind now at the end of this amazing, amazing day...

Click to view attachment

Tomorrow's plans

952 p0657.01 0 0 0 0 0 0 navcam_7x1_az_90_1_bpp
952 p1151.04 0 0 0 0 0 0 front_hazcam_idd_unstow_doc
952 p1154.01 0 0 0 0 0 0 front_hazcam_idd_unstow_doc
952 p1201.06 0 0 0 0 0 0 front_haz_penultimate_1bpp_pri34
952 p1212.09 0 0 0 0 0 0 front_haz_ultimate_2_bpp_pri15
952 p1301.05 0 0 0 0 0 0 rear_haz_penultimate_1bpp_pri34
952 p1312.07 0 0 0 0 0 0 rear_haz_ultimate_2_bpp_pri15
952 p1585.00 0 0 0 0 0 0 navcam_cloud_4x1_dwnsmp_RVRAz_calstart
952 p1585.00 0 0 0 0 0 0 navcam_cloud_4x1_dwnsmp_RVRAz_calstart
952 p1622.03 0 0 0 0 0 0 navcam_2x1_az_36_3_bpp
952 p2631.01 0 0 0 0 0 0 pancam_sky_spot_L234567R34567

nice one, Stu !
your artist's impressions of Victoria are getting better all the time
I especially like the clouds and the detail colorization on the left hand outcrop ...

It's quite nice... but if I may ask, why do you introduce artificial lens flare into the picture? I always thought that was a bug, not a feature, of photography, which it was desirable to eliminate.

Your question intrigued me.... I found THIS in Wikipedia.

"Deliberate use
Perhaps because the most dramatic images ever seen by regular people are typically made possible only through photography and television, a lens flare is often used to deliberately invoke that same sense of drama. A lens flare is also useful when added to an artificial or modified image composition because it adds a sense of realism, implying that the image is an un-edited original photograph of a 'Real-life' scene."