[meteorite-list] Mars Rover Opportunity Nearing Marathon Achievement

[Ron Baalke]

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=4479

Mars Rover Nearing Marathon Achievement
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
February 10, 2015

-- Opportunity rover approaches marathon milestone of 42.195 kilometers

-- Rover's science destination is "Marathon Valley"

NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity is nearing a location on Mars 
at which its driving distance will surpass the length of a marathon race.

A drive on Feb. 8, 2015, put the rover within 220 yards (200 meters) of 
this marathon accomplishment. An Olympic marathon is 26.219 miles (42.195 
kilometers).

Opportunity is headed for a portion of the western rim of Endeavour Crater 
where observations by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have detected 
multiple types of clay minerals. These minerals are indicative of an ancient 
wet environment where water was more neutral rather than harshly acidic. 
More than six months ago, the rover team informally named that destination 
"Marathon Valley," having estimated what the odometry would total by the 
time Opportunity gets there.

"When Opportunity was in its prime mission 11 years ago, no one imagined 
this vehicle surviving a Martian winter, let alone completing a marathon 
on Mars," said Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager John Callas of NASA's 
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California. "Now, that achievement 
is within reach as Opportunity approaches a strategic science destination. 
What's most important about the longevity and driving distance the mission 
keeps extending are not numerical thresholds, but the wealth of scientific 
information returned about Mars, made possible by these feats."

Before driving Opportunity into Marathon Valley, the team plans to use 
the rover for observations of an impact crater called "Spirit of Saint 
Louis Crater," at the entrance to the valley.

The team is operating Opportunity in a mode that avoids use of the rover's 
flash memory. In this mode, data gathered during each Martian day are 
stored in volatile memory and transmitted to an orbiter before the rover's 
overnight, energy-conserving "sleep." NASA orbiters Mars Odyssey and Mars 
Reconnaissance Orbiter relay the rover data to Earth.

Opportunity engineers plan in coming weeks to upload a software revision 
they have developed to enable resuming use of non-volatile flash memory. 
It is designed to restore Opportunity's capability to store data overnight 
or longer, for transmitting later.

During its original three-month prime mission, beginning after landing 
on Jan. 25, 2004, UST (Jan. 24, 2004, PST) Opportunity drove 0.48 mile 
(771.5 meters). Its twin, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit, landed 
three weeks earlier and covered 0.39 mile (635 meters) in its three-month 
prime mission. Both Spirit and Opportunity have returned compelling evidence 
about wet environments on ancient Mars. Spirit's mission ended in 2010. 
Since 2011, Opportunity has been investigating the western rim of Endeavour, 
a crater that is 14 miles (22 kilometers) in diameter.

The rover climbed to its highest elevation on the Endeavour rim on Jan. 
6, 2015, reaching a point about 440 feet (135 meters) above the local 
plains. It has driven about 440 yards (400 meters) since then, mainly 
southward toward the entrance to Marathon Valley.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, 
manages the Mars Exploration Rover Project for NASA's Science Mission 
Directorate in Washington. For more information about Spirit and Opportunity, 
visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/rovers

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov

You can follow the project on Twitter and on Facebook at:

http://twitter.com/MarsRovers

http://www.facebook.com/mars.rovers


Media Contact

Guy Webster
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-6278
guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov 

2015-055