Consisten trip on Sol289 (almost 20m):
Click to view attachment
Using a smothed/resized version, comparison with MGS shows lot of recognizable features (arrows): as expected, the slight slope near erebus rim introduce a distorsion in the features position/size close to the bottom of image (they appear farther and bigger than real):
Click to view attachment

mhoward: That movie was more fun than the roller coaster at the amuzement park. What a ride! Thanks.

Dilo: I'm convinced your sol 589 location is very accurate. The outcrop features you have identified correlate very well across the images. As I have followed your excellent route maps from the start, I have come to realize just how much work is required to provide these to the community. Thank you, for your dedicated efforts.

Thanks, Cosmic... is a hard work but I'm more and more gratified to see results matching with satellite imagery! .

Last one was one of the post-Purgatory longest trip in a Sol: odometry should be well above 20m, considering the deviation toward West...

Dilo, I enjoy browsing your frequent updates of Oppy's route. I think the rover is hoping as much as possible on the outcrop lands. So now, the closest outcrops land is on the west side.

Rodolfo

I guess too, West looks better - from (Dilo's) bird's view: http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.p...pe=post&id=1404

Time for a science stop? Lots of complex layering visbible:

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...00P1214R0M1.JPG

Be sure.
There were four driving days in a row; that's a lot!

Somebody remember the last time Oppy drove four (or more) days without taking a breath?

I remember seing it on a Black and White television.

Doug

Maybe.
There are some possible "obstacles" on the west path (see below).
Click to view attachment

Remember those days zigzagging to the Highway?

Wasn't that just before she splatted into Purgatory Dune?

That breakneck drive thru the back alleys of Meridiani worried me. I'm not worried with the pace now since the rover drivers now seem to have a good handle on spotting trouble areas.

--Bill

I've just checked old traverse maps, and there were five driving days from sols 520 to 524. It's just after getting unstuck and driving back north.

Well, if we count the "driving days" while trying to get free from Purgatory dune...

BTW, and still talking about driving days, today (sol 592) is another one; the fifth.

Here is a clip from an MOC image of Erebus with the Opportunity route (to Sol 590) and the place names given in the 23Sept Mission Update. The image looks a bit harsh as I've twiddled with it to emphasize the ripple-bedrock areas and some fine detail. Until we can tweak a better base image, this will do to show us where we are and where we need to go.

Meanwhile, it seems that a 360* Navcan pan is waiting...

--Bill

Here is a Sol 589 Pancam panorama with the place names given in the 23 Sept Mission Update added. 5x1 Autostitch, 5x exaggeration.

--Bill

Bill: This map (thanks Tman!) is more accurate to your MOC image.

http://xs47.xs.to/pics/05386/Opportunity_S...us_Features.jpg

Good Pancam shots or Erebus:

http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...00P2381R2M1.JPG

The ripples inside look much smaller than those outside the crater.

Sol 592: South Shetland arrival

My updated route map:

My update is a little bit late, due to stitch problem... Very good agreement with your position, SRFan!
Click to view attachment
note that outcrops in the West direction aren't visible due to a huge dune.

Dilo, just a very minor correction to your last route map:
The ultimate position you indicate on it should be for sol 592 (site/drive 6200) and not for sol 591 (site/drive 6100).

Let me say again thanks for this outstanding work; it's an unvaluable tool to pinpoint the rover location. Dunno if JPL/NASA uses a similar tool (I would say yes) but, imho, currently it is -- and in the short/middle term will still be -- the only way to correctly locate the rover.

Thanks, Tesheiner. I updated my last route map correcting this error and completing the missing panorama portion:

Was wondering if anyone had a chance to look at the route to the west, best guess?

Here is my (wild) guess. Time will tell...

Here is my WAG. The problem is that the North side is a Sea of Dunes and we're going to have to ziggy-zag the way through. Possibly the most hazardous route we've had, but evidently the rover planners think that this is a good enough outcrop.

Map attached, with possible routes.

--Bill


PS: apologies to Tscheiner, I wasn't trying to upstage you with another map; our posts crossed in the mail.

PPS: revised the Erebus map image; didn't like the first version.

Steve Squyres Update: September 26, 2006(?)

--- The decision's made... we're going to go west, counterclockwise around Erebus Crater. ---

http://athena.cornell.edu/news/mubss/

"Counterclockwise" *phew* for a while I worried they would just browse the eastern side and go on yet another long trek again. So your maps Tesheiner and Bill Harris surely do show where the rover might drive now. Yes I do think those outcrops are interesting enough for a closer investigation. Not that I have any real influence in the matter.

From Space.com
(http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/050928_opportunity_update.html)

(...)
The decision has been made by scientists and engineers operating the robot to go west, counterclockwise around the crater. Erebus is nearly twice the diameter of Endurance Crater, an earlier “pit stop” of Opportunity that produced a bonanza of science data.

“We’re there, for all intents and purposes,” said Steve Squyres of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Squyres is principal investigator for the Opportunity and Spirit Mars rover science instruments.

“We can see most of the crater from where we are right now, and we’ve made the decision that we’re going to traverse around it on its western side,” Squyres told SPACE.com. “We’re actually going to start the drive around the crater by going north a little bit…to get onto terrain that’s mostly bedrock…before we swing west.”

Squyres said that as Opportunity makes its way counterclockwise around the crater, the science team and rover drivers are keeping their eyes sharp, looking for a safe place to possibly enter Erebus Crater.

“The goal being to get to a place we’ve named the ‘Mogollon Rim’…on the western side. If we can find a safe place to go in, that’s great... if we can’t, we’ll just continue on to the south,” Squyres added.
(...)

So it looks like we'll be hanging around Erebus until the new year at least - which is cool. I know a lot of folks - myself included - are itching to get to Victoria - but I guess that'll have to wait.

They must be either very optimistic or very pessimistic about ever getting to Victoria, i.e., the decision regarding Erebus doesn't make much difference one way or the other.

Well I don't know about them but I'm verry pessimistic...Winter is comming fast these days...
Victoria is still more than 1 mile away...and there is no "highway" to there...
I would like to belive that Oppy is going to make it in the end but.....that's just me...

update...

It ain't over 'til the rover spontaneously explodes.

The first image is an exaggerated pan of last night's Pancam offering, 1P180830677EFF6200P2383L2M1 and points rightward.

Oppy is still on the SouthShetlands exposure. Erebus is on the left side with the beginning of the Mogollon Rim visible. The "monster dunefield" seen on the MOC maps is next, and the ripple field on the North rim of Erebus is between Oppy and that dunefield. The possible path on the evaporite bedrock is to the right of that ripple field and is not visible. In a Sol or two she'll be positioned to look along the pathway.

BTW, if you want to see the view un-exaggerated, resize this image: 100% horizontal, 20% vertical (5x exagerration, 1/5=20%).

--Bill

PS-- an earlier series of Pancam images, 1P180569210-, was taken on the way to South Shetlands and shows the pathway next to the ripple field. I'll add this second image in case we don't get "new and improved" imagery til next week...

Oppy has joined Spirit with at least 600 sols.

Congrats to the MER team!

Expected EDRs by sequence number and image type:

Sol Seq.Ver ETH ESF EDN EFF ERP Tot Description
--- -------- --- --- --- --- --- ---- -----------
...
600 p2387.06 19 0 0 19 4 42 pancam_front_outcrop_4cx1r_L234567Rall
600 p2388.06 8 0 0 8 2 18 pancam_rear_outcrop_4pos_L7R1
...

The road ahead from ground level. Are we heading for slghtly left of middle? Or going around wider on the path at right?

Yay! The big 6-oh-oh.


She'll be taking the outcrop path to the right. For the last few Sols (and the next couple of Sols) the landmark has been the near ripple with the crater/depression in the side. The goal for the time being is the large ripple (small dune-?) field on the left side of second frame of your stitch.

--Bill

Last route map wasn't easy to assemble, even though panorama includes rover tracks... At the end, I'm almost sure of final, approximate location for Sol599.
As highlighted by Bill, it seems Oppy is following an outcrop zig-zag path (very nevrotic indeed ); the average SW direction is as expected.
I made also some changes in the route layout and adjusted projections orientation...

Nice piece of detective work, dilo! Seems like progress-made-good towards Payton is only going to be about 60% of total milage? So if Payton is ~100m distant, Oppy's gonna dune-dance for 160m?

Does 15 days seem like a reasonable guess on how long before we near Payton?

I just got back from a vacation trip where my internet access was extremely limited... and it is so good to see all this action on Mars. But best of all is these fabulous maps by Dilo and others... I especially like Dilo's amazing results, though. They could hardly have better maps in the planning meetings.

Phil

thanks for nice words, Phil. However, I must admit that my maps could be strongly improved by using precise orientation infos and even approximante topography (DTM)... So they probably HAVE better maps in the planning meeteng...

Are you sure about this map, Dilo?

I have my concerns, because there was no drive on sol 599 but just a rear looking 5x1 navcam pano. Imho, we are still at 598 position and the track marks you see on 599 pano are those from 592's drive.

I must admit, I checked and now I recognize the features East to 598 location!
In fact, as I told, I wasn't sure of my last assembly, so thank you for correction.
Pls, disregard my last update and keep checking future updates...

I though there were too many zigs-and-zags. Sometimes this "TLAR" seat-of-the-pants navigation can lead to errors. Not being critical, your maps are great.

The "near ripple with the crater/depression in the side" I mentioned earlier is just north of your Sol-599 endpoint. I believe that Oppy is going to pass just North of that landmark on the Westward trek; I have no idea exactly were we will go from there.

Great work!

--Bill

At this point, I cross my fingers before to post this new map...
Click to view attachment
identifications still hard, I think because we are traversing a field of tall dunes and we have poor visibility of feature in West direction... so, if someone find major incongruences, pls tell me!
I changed map layout, re-introducing letters because waypoints identifications are harder in a zig-zag path like this... moreover, I reproduced the path in the MGS insert, making easier identification in the wide scale contest.

PS: Bill, thanks for encouraging words
PPSS: could you explain "TLAR seat-of-the-pants navigation" meaning?...

Dilo, based on your position for Sol 598 (g), and the proposed drive to Sol 8601 (h), your Map Sol 601a looks about right. Good work.

TLAR is an abbreviation/acronym for "That Looks About Right". "Seat-of-the-pants navigation" is navigation by intuition, or what looks about right. American slang, I forget that we have many readers here that don't understand "foreign slang" like that...

We need to come up with a name for the large dune field ahead (on the left side of your MOC image). Getting by that is going to be the dangerous part of this leg of the journey to Mogollon.

--Bill

(Starting a little break on the annular eclipse observations)

I have the feeling that they are doing some sort of polar/vertical projections.
Why? If you have a look to the navcam panos taken on sol 601 drive and also on previous sols, sometimes Oppy shot two panos during the drive; the first at middrive and the second (and final) at post-drive.

What is the purpose of taking this middrive panorama? My opinion is that it is used to make the same (or similar) projection as Dilo is providing to us.
As I already said before, this is the best (if not only) way to track the rover position with the MOC imagery.

(Going back outdoor to continue looking the solar eclipse...)

They've done that mid-drive navcam mosaic's very rarely - infact I think the last few days with Oppy are the first time I've seen it.

It makes for good mapping of the outcropping, which is obviously an interesting thing to look at.

Doug

Dilo / Bill,

I was trying to locate similar features between sol 598 and 601 navcam images, and it is was really difficult with just the ahead-looking panorama.
Now, the navcam pano looking backwards is at the exploratorium and I think that Oppy drove even more that proposed on Dilo's route map.

Here is my "proposal" plotted on sol 598 data. Note that the pictures are heavily compressed to save space/bandwith. If you have your own made panoramas, use them as reference.

Comments?

Here is a Pancam L2 panoramic view from that same area.

Taken on Sol 589.


jvandriel

The middrive panorama from sol 601 (site/drive 62AF) is available too and it seems to confirm the two-leg drive.