Sol 2734: Easing Down the Hill

As the team built today’s plan on Earth, Curiosity was busy on Mars wrapping up the analysis of the nodular bedrock target “Adder” which was planned yesterday. After Curiosity completes the Adder analysis, she will do a slight turn to place her high gain antenna in a better position for Earth to send her today’s plan. However, because we have to send Curiosity today’s plan before we know that the turn was successful, we are planning on faith that she will be ready to receive our commands. This and the fact that we are only planning one sol today meant that we kept today’s plan simple. ChemCam will collect calibration data from their calibration targets and Navcam will acquire a dust devil movie. Using imaging from previous sols, we were also able to plan the drive that will take us off the sandstones of the “Greenheugh pediment” and back down toward the mudstones of the clay-bearing “Glen Torridon” region. Our time on the pediment was very successful, and looking back downhill at the tracks we dug getting up onto the pediment makes the time we got to spend there all the sweeter. Pouring over the dozens of Mastcam and ChemCam mosaics we acquired while up on the pediment will keep the science team busy as we guide Curiosity through the next leg of her journey in Gale crater!