Here is a special poster to mark the occasion of the Phoenix Lander achieving 90 Sols.
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A full resolution version is available here.
A half size version is available here.

Enjoy
Astro0

New mission phase, new UMSF logo ( Thanks Astro0 ! )

Doug

How long was its recent mission extension? By that moment, the snow has started to appear above of coldest places.

Another month and a bit -- through Sept. 30.

The new banner rules! Well done indeed, Astro0!:)

(Good to be back...one week of hellish moving almost finally done...lots of catching up to do!)

Maybe it is just because I haven't tried to create such a logo, but I suspect I never would have designed one as artful as that. Nice work, Asto0. Not only is the logo clever, but the entire poster captures the theme. Outstanding!

It's not entirely obvious to me why the sol 65 thread was closed, but I'll assume it is time to move discussions to the extended mission thread. The following quote is from the previous thread. If I've misplaced this comment, hopefully the mods will move it.

That was a pretty interesting story, and a nice summary of the work done so far. I can't help but wonder if perhaps this ClO₄^- story has really surprised the Phoenix team at this late date in the mission. Has the robotic arm delivered enough samples from enough locations to the various instruments to define the extent of the perchlorate ions, and if indeed there are any perchlorate concentration gradients?

It sounds like a tricky wicket to me, so lately in the game.

There is a trio of Sol 90 "low sun" images - taken at 00.50, 00.51 and 00.56 - that make a nice animation...

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By the way, new poem - "First Frost" - now up on my poetry blog, if anyone wants a look...

Here's a view of the bright spots in Snow White and Burn Alive, from sol 89

Sol 89, 16:04 L1/L2

The lowest sun elevation is now about 0.7 degrees, but it already fully set behind the slight rise to the north for about half an hour. However today there's already a very nice picture of the half-sun:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/phoenix/...90_sunrise.html

Bye-bye

Mars24 says that Sol 98 is the first day with an actual sun-set - so we get a funky week of partial sunsets

Any official information about how long Phoenix will stay power positive and be able to work?

At work the new banner is up but here at home same old banner any ideas?
Roy

Clear your cache.

Or just force refresh (shift+refresh button).

Thank you Elkgrovedan and Matt, my cache is now clear and new banner is nicely in place also thank you Asto0 for the poster and via Doug for the banner
Roy

Look who got mentioned in a tweet from Phoenix.

Will the sharpness of the SSI enough to show some details on the horizon (if any) ?

Mark Lemmon's Phoenix SSI raw images directory:
Sol 091: Hold sample (restricted sols). Remote sensing and continued Stone Soup documentation.
Sol 092: Drop sample. Load plate test; sunrise & remote sensing

Drop sample, but where ?

That would be the Golden Goose sample from Stone Soup trench, going to the third of four MECA Wet Chemistry Labs.

It sounds like Stone Soup is relatively ice free and that it wouldn't take long, therefore, for any ice in the sample to sublimate away.

I've got to say, the feeling of tense urgency I had about getting an actual ice sample into TEGA before the end of the mission is verging on resignation that it's not going to happen. I would trade a million sunset photos for completion of the half-dozen things that Phoenix actually went to Mars to do.

That sample is going into MECA, so they are not looking for an ice sample.

As far as getting an ice sample into TEGA goes, I am sure that no one wants to do that more than the mission scientists. I wonder how their plans to do that are coming along? There may only be one more oven that opens fully (unless, hopefully, all the ovens on the side of #0 open well). I was a little surprised to see them use oven 7 (perhaps the next-to-last fully opening oven) for an ice-free sample.

Long shadows may actually help them in the quest to get an icy sample. They were speculating that sunlight made the adhesion to the scoop worse.

AFAIK, the sunlight DID make the regolith clumpiness worse. The idea is that the ice softend in the sun & caused it to stick together. Aslo the scoop is dark, absorbing solar energy, warming it up slightly, thus making the ice rich regolith contained within to clump, as the ice rehardened.

The idea f perhaps scooping some samples in the half light of the polar midnight twilight (as the sun will be setting 'properly' from this Saturday onwards) sounds much better.

Delivering ice rich samples to TEGA should be easier as it should be more of a fine granular mix, rather than the stodgy stuff that has proven so difficult to load.

The minus side of course, with proper night time arriving, well deep twilight (even on Sol 124 the final sol of the current extension, the Sun will only dip to just over four degrees below the horizon at midnight), power will become a big issue.

Will each active period every Sol have to be reduced in duration to allow more time for recharging batteries?

Andrew Brown.

Is there an official Phoenix (horizon) mosaic that has included degrees details of the orientation? Didn't find any so far. But they are orientated each with a particular main-direction.

I've tried to find the spot of the sunrise on sol 90. According to Mars24 the elevation was 1.3° and azimuth 11.8°. I used not the full res. mosaic, so I had to resize the sunrise image to find a match at the calculated position (based on the fact of where I fit North in the image).

Here my guess: (1.3MB) http://www.greuti.ch/phoenix/sunrisepano_sm_17106.jpg

Way back in the Planetary Society Weblog: Phoenix sol 76 update: Digging at Neverland [...]:



Not that imaging takes so very much power -- as compared to the likes of TEGA baking or arm digging -- but maybe imaging is part of a general curtailment of nighttime activites.

Couldn't resist animating this sequence...

Click to view attachment

Managed to download the 60MB fullres of PeterPan.

860KB http://www.greuti.ch/phoenix/sunrise90.gif

Btw. this one was used for the sunrise image.


Edited

The azimuth data of the sol 90 sunrise images are a bit odd:

lg_24930 50:52 elevation 5.03164 degrees and azimuth 13.2373 degrees
lg_24931 51:45 elevation 5.03367 degrees and azimuth 13.2360 degrees
lg_24932 56:50 elevation 5.03470 degrees and azimuth 13.2369 degrees

What's the exact meaning of "The camera pointing was..."? Does this correspond to the actual elevation (notional horizon) and azimuth degrees seen from the same point as the camera?

... or the azimuth and elevation in the lander's coordinate system?

Phil

If it is the azimuth and elevation in the lander coordinate system (pointing means the center of the image probably), is then the Mars24 solar elevation of 1.3° and azimuth 11.8° definitely correct?

I'm making a new map of the work volume with James' sol 84 pan as a base. Here's the names I've come up with so far. Is there a name for the dump piles at the top of Snow White? Are there any other names that should be on this map?

--Emily

Hmmm. I appreciate that the journalistic hype over perchlorates probably upset the applecart. But really, at least the old television stations had the courtesy to put up program interruption signs. I guess NASA and Artizona St U have decided to emulate the ESA.

My nickname at school was Ichabod, I was skinny and brainy, lol. I am now not skinny and for the brains, well you know how age affects those, and beer.....

Sometimes you really feel older

Arizona State?? You just stepped into it, Oz.

JPL Phoenix Mission News: NASA Phoenix Mission Conducting Extended Activities on Mars (August 29)

however data has shown that the gas flow has been erratic

"Something" must be breezing inside

Em: I really appreciate your awesome work volume maps. I have no help with names for those tailings piles.
What I would really like to see on such maps is an outline of the polygon boundaries in the area. Are there not any within reach of the robotic arm?

I just had to say, "Sometimes you really are older."

Duh! I forgot that some of our members had posted several polar pans. James' Phoenix Polar Peter Pan is one of them. Should we call it the P⁴ pan? If anyone can do it, I think a vertical projection of the imagery would be helpful.

As best as I can tell, all of the trenches so far have been within this polygon, and some of the local polygon's boundaries are barely within reach of the robotic arm. Can we dig into a polygon boundary, or not?

I'm commenting from my RV in Lufkin, Tx, as we evacuate the gulf coast ahead of hurricane Gustav. I am hoping to avoid the storm and swing back behind it, as it comes ashore. Wish us luck.

Planetary Society Weblog: Catching up with Phoenix, through sol 91

Take care, CR, and any other UMSF members or lurkers in the path of the storm.

Change of weather ?

Onset wind - sol 94
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and strong cloudiness - sol 95
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1B02-3: Ice SHorizon Movie (Sol 94)

sample
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http://www.met.tamu.edu/mars/094.html

Is this clouds, or a continuation of the N Polar dust activity mentioned here?
http://www.msss.com/msss_images/2008/08/27/index.html

Here you go... LOVE this sequence...!!

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Sol-94 Telltale animation's .

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This is one of my favorite sofar of the telltale, showing background clouds in the field of view.

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