30th May 2017 Sol 1711

This Navigation camera image gives  feel for the slopes of Aeolis Mons that we are climbing now.  Daily drives often now ascend ~2 m and we have more battery recharging days.

We are just a  few drives from Vera Rubin Ridge (VRR) where we will test the ‘ground truth’ for the orbital identification of the iron oxide hematite. For the next few days and once we are at VRR we will be taking ChemCam and other data to check compositional changes.  One hypothesis we have been working on is that VRR may have been exposed to near surface conditions with the flow of large amounts of oxidising groundwater.

The approach upslope to Vera Rubin (Hematite) Ridge

 

 

 

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jbridges

About jbridges

This blog is a record of my experiences and work during the Mars Science Laboratory mission, from the preparation, landing on August 5th 2012 Pacific Time, and onwards... I will also post updates about our other Mars work on meteorites, ExoMars and new missions. You can also follow the planetary science activities with @LeicsPlanets Professor John Bridges, School of Physics and Astronomy

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