Released as PIA05260: Opportunity's Path
Submitted by cjohns.  -kurt

Opportunity PIO Candidate
WAYPOINTS
Sol 19 / February 12, 2004


IMAGE CAPTION for WAYPOINTS:

Opportunity's Path - This Long Term Planning graphic was created from
a mosaic of navigation camera images overlain by a polar coordinate
grid with the center point as Opportunity's original landing site.
The blue dots represent the rover position at various locations.

The red dots represent the center points of the target areas for the
instruments on the rover mast (the panoramic camera and miniature
thermal emission spectrometer).  Opportunity visited Stone Mountain on
Feb. 5.  Stone Mountain was named after the southernmost point of the
Appalachian Mountains outside of Atlanta, Ga.  On Earth, Stone
Mountain is the last big mountain before the Piedmont flatlands, and
on Mars, Stone Mountain is at one end of Opportunity Ledge.  El
Capitan is a target of interest on Mars named after the second highest
peak in Texas in Guadaloupe National Park, which is one of the most
visited outcrops in the United States by geologists.  It has been a
training ground for students and professional geologists to understand
what the layering means in relation to the formation of Earth, and
scientists will study this prominent point of Opportunity Ledge to
understand what the layering means on Mars.

The yellow lines show the midpoint where the panoramic camera has
swept and will sweep a 120-degree area from the three waypoints on the
tour of the outcrop.  Imagine a fan- shaped wedge from left to right
of the yellow line.

The white contour lines are one meter apart, and each drive has been
roughly about 2-3 meters in length over the last few sols. The large
white blocks are dropouts in the navigation camera data.

Opportunity is driving along and taking a photographic panorama of the
entire outcrop.  Scientists will stitch together these images and use
the new mosaic as a "base map" to decide on geology targets of
interest for a more detailed study of the outcrop using the
instruments on the robotic arm.  Once scientists choose their targets
of interest, they plan to study the outcrop for roughly five to
fifteen sols.  This will include El Capitan and probably one to two
other areas.

Image created by John Grotzinger and the Long Term Planning Team. 

Blue Dot Dates

Sol 7 / Jan 31 = Egress & first soil data collected by instruments on
the arm

Sol 9 / Feb 2 = Second Soil Target

Sol 12 /  Feb 5 = First Rock Target 

Sol 16 / Feb 9 = Alpha Waypoint

Sol 17 / Feb 10 = Bravo Waypoint

Sol 19 or 20 / Feb 12 or 13 =  Charlie Waypoint



<br> USERNAME: schwehr