Looks like a vein in the rock to me.

Early in the missions we had a few strands of airbag material that blew into the microscope images...

Agreed. This simply looks like a healed fracture in the rock. Too early to call it anything else-- we'll have more images in a few days.

The adjacent site "Mpangeni" has a very intriguing texture and shows both rounded and angular clasts in the matrix. Even down to the microscopic scale, this initial set of MI's at "T2_Haven" show this difference in particle angularity and a distressing lack of sorting.

This will prove to be an exciting area.

--Bill

Agreed...a vein or a fracture.

"Mpangeni"...

Click to view attachment

...gesundheit!

Lovely work, Stu. THAT is an interesting-looking little beast...a wind-eroded breccia?

I'm travel-weary and cranky. Someone fill me in on what's down from the weekend plan so I don't have to read my 76 (and counting) unread emails from today alone! (Read: "Do my work for me.")



-m

Main items down are an initial set of MI's from the current IDD target "T2_Haven" and some interesting shots of an adjacent site "Mpangeni" and a couple more nearby sites "photometry east and west" and "brightsoil east and west". and a couple of Superres sequences on Tribulation and Dunes.

All in all, a busy weekend.

--Bill

Superres on Tribulation -- for the far-sighted among us!

Mpangeni (is the name right?!) renders very nicely in 3D, from a fresh batch of images, Sol 2788.

Click to view attachment

The martian rocks remind me of geological formations near Bariloche, Argentina:

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My 3D take on "Mpangeni"...

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The cleft area seems to have a fibrous inclusion.

Whoa! Look at that crumbling v-notch. If it was a little larger and a thing like that could become a serious wheel trap.

Yep... full resolution version here: http://twitpic.com/7l6252/full

A mini-Dagger! Very nice.

Phil

Here is a quick comparison of the sundial from Sol 55 to Sol 2718 (7+ yrs)
Both are from raw images and were identically processed.
The differences are sun angle (brightness), dust on the target, and probably the camera.
(L4,5,6 filters only)

Click to view attachment Click to view attachment

How did that VIMS composite of Titan (e.g. http://www.uidaho.edu/sci/physics/news/topfeatures/titan ) get there?!

Here is an x-eyed stereo view of site Mpangeni, an L346 and R721 image.

Note the cleft in the lower left of the site apparently with active precipitation within the fracture.

--Bill

Another drive and another incredible view on 2790:
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...0M1.JPG?sol2790

Heck yeah!

We're perched about 5 meters away from a very nice batch of northerly tilts. I spy a Winter Haven!

Unfortunately we're squeezed by late morning/early afternoon comm passes -- tighter than usual this week. Very little drive time, even though the energy is plenty high for it. Might take a few sols.

-m

And still a dusty LowGain antenna. Cf: this post: http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.p...&pid=180403

They weren't kidding about travelling. Even with the smattering of Navcam views the comm passes allow these are tantalizing glimpses of CY morphology. Even the FHazcam images are great boot-scuffs of the surface.

Or, as The Great One said, "How sweet it is..."

--Bill

Here's the 3x1 navcam mosaic. Today's imaging plan includes the remaining 7 pictures so a whole 360º panorama should be available soon.
Click to view attachment

And a wonderful Pancam sequence of a new site, "Transvaal". Such great tonal range with fine gradation between colors, and such a texture of the surface.

--Bill

Wow. We can now see the Cyclops crater from the navcam.

So, does that mean the tau has become better?

I'd have to wait for a three-d view to be sure, but it certainly looks like a good perch for rolling the wheels up on it and get a great tilt.

"Transvaal"

Click to view attachment

Wondering why they choose names referring to South Africa while looking for Northern tilt

It's been visible in navcam for quite a while - here's a shot from 2668:
http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/all...N5P1944R0M1.JPG
But it is easier to see now, since tau is gradually dropping. You can follow the tau here.

I love the way that the summit of CY blends in with the other (much bigger) peaks around the rim of Endeavour in this shot:
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...0M1.JPG?sol2790

Yep! Kinda Everest-like pan is coming up.

Imagine striding up that slope, standing on the ridge and, shielding your eyes from the Sun with your gloved hand, looking over the other side, down onto the floor of Endeavour and across to the other side...

Click to view attachment



(Wanted to make my 5,000th post something special )

Anyone know the location of this with respect to the pancam images?

Yes, I can imagine that...since you posted this 3D view. THANKS!

My apologies for this unorthodox way of presenting this Sol 2790 shot, but it was the only way I could do it so parts of the image wouldn't be so headache inducing in 3D, had to chop it up! Anyway, more superb, freaky rocks, loaded with features:

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Site "Transvaal", Sol-2790 , R721-L346 x-eyed stereo pair.

Compare with "Mpangeni" inpost #68 on 11/29.

--Bill

Here's my attempt at de-headaching that view:
Click to view attachment

Does the trick for me! Very good.

Here is an L456 of Transvaal. No sharping, just the barest of color cranking.
Notice the green in the top left corner, which always exhibits a vignette (... probably causing it)
Click to view attachment

Here's Bill's X-eyed, false colored pair of Transvaal (sol 2790) in anaglyph form.
Click to view attachment

Thankee, Tom! Stereo for the masses. I don't bother with anaglyphs because I'm one of that type that can do x-eyed stero with my bare eyes. It's good to see other presentation types open up.

Not much more data for Sol-2790, but for tosol (hitting in about an hour) we'll have a set of L257 rear track "boot scuffs" (p2434), some L257Rall of "North Haven" (p2435), Finally: a pancam_foreground_quarter_L234567Rall (p2587) and a Navcam sequence to the NE (Az330). Nothing spectacular, but some nice puzzlepieces.

--Bill

According to the Nov 30 TPS update, it was somewhere on Transvaal.

Speaking of that update:

Continuing our series of "Not suggesting for a moment that it's accurate, but it is pretty" Fanciful Images that Oppy Never Took, I give you, "Endeavour Sunrise..."

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There are lots of juicy tidbits in the latest Planetary update. Here are the highlights:
OOhhh, sparkly bits. I wonder if that's a clue. Either way, the sparkles don't seem to have survived the jpegging/stretching of the released images.



Planning for winter:


And some very interesting discussion about the possibility of cleaning events:

If the wind is coming from the southeast, and the rover deck is tilted towards the north (actually more like northwest), wouldn't any wind just clean the underside of the deck, not the solar panels? (Unless we got a down-draft.)

While there is still sufficient power, it might be worth briefly going over the ridge and facing the southeast.

Sol 2790 navcam pan

We'd have to be tilted away at a pretty big angle to not get anything on the topside. Basic aerodynamics -- air's still flowing up there!

I think we discussed turning towards the crater at one meeting a while back. Given that we have no idea (...at all) when a cleaning gust could come, the errors bars are simply too big to risk it. Doing that even for a short time would likely be a significant waste. We'd be gambling the rover for something we think might happen once a year... That's a hard sell point!

Better go where we know we can survive: North-facing places!

-m

My take, FWIW, is that this region is in the calm-wind part of the year and the lack of cleaning Zephyrs is seasonal. After the Solstice and Aphelion hemispheric heating will pick up and so will seasonal winds. Make the best of it for now.

Oh yes, and make more Foreground Quarters. It's all happening at our feet...

--Bill

Isn't this ridge top a place where dust accumulates rather than getting blown away? I'm thinking of the 'brightsoil', both east and west. Is it the same material that produces the icing sugar effect on top of the dunes in Victoria and Santa Maria? If so, it seems to be much more abundant here. On the other hand there is none of the stuff on the 'inboard' slopes so I have to agree with the idea of parking a little bit more 'inboard' than an analysis based purely on insolation would dictate, especially if the number of northerly degrees available provides some leeway.