Written by Susanne Schwenzer, a planetary geologist at Open University

Earth Plan Date: Friday, May 16, 2025

As curiosity develops, Mount Sharp crosses different terrain, which the team has drawn from tracks. If you want to follow this path and see for yourself, take a look at "Curiosity?" MAP, an interactive tool that allows you to see all the stops the rover does. If you look very closely, you will see that the stop on the SOL 4532 is located in the area with very textured and red expression on the map, while the next stop on the SOL 4534 is located in a grayer area, and the stop after that (SOL 4537) (SOL 4537) is again on the red material, but the texture has much less texture. The next two sites, including today’s parking spaces, are very close to the North-South running linear function. Just look at the locations of these different sites, and what you see on this interactive tool, and you can give you the full story of the latest planning day.

We've been through the rough-looking terrain for a while. So, as this change gets closer, the team starts to plan for how to investigate. Of course, we add the ground image to the picture as we go over close distance on each drive. Last week, we were finally able to start making plans as we stood on the brink of landscape changes on SOL 4532. As you can see from the interactive map, the drive is a little shorter to make sure we stop with each new feature example. So we stop in the grey area on the SOL 4534 and then look like the middle of the Reddish area on the SOL 4537 and then reach the linear function.

Unfortunately, instead of reading the script, Mars placed an annoying pebbles under one of our wheels (see the blog post "SOLS 4541-4542: She wants structure, or just 'Box-like' structure?"). Whenever the rover is not on the firm ground, we cannot extend our arms. Therefore, the engineer used the drive in the last plan to pull the rover back to the cycle where the wheels were not available. Now, we stop the solid ground of the linear sexual function and we can perform arm movements! This always makes the planning team cheer.

Staying stable provides us with many opportunities to get in touch with science. After carefully discussing what was in front of us, we decided to adopt the target "Arroyo seco", where the brush - DRT - could be applied and the brushed material could be APXS measurements. APX will then measure the edges of that large feature, where the rocks are more resistant to weathering—at least that's what the fact they extend out might suggest. That's the goal "Mesa Grande". Near Mesa Grande is the target "Paso Picacho", which is the same part of the second APX target on the ridge. In addition, Chemcam also studied the ridge characteristics of the target "Pauma Valley".

On a weekend, there will always be more time and curiosity will make the most of it! In addition to the two APX and Chemcam Libs targets, Chemcam will also conduct passive spectroscopy studies of the target "San Ysidro" to study the texture we see in the MastCAM images. Talk about mastcam…there are many interesting features nearby that will increase our investigation of this new landscape expression. Therefore, MastCam has over 50 frames in the plan to image the ridges, cracks and textures around the rovers. Today, most targets have descriptive names like "cracks," but there are two names (all from the area where the JPL in California is located!): "Dos Palmas Oasis" is looking at brighter stones in the middle of the field, while "Sespe Gorge" looks at large, large, Rubbles-worthy rocks. Of course, MastCam will also document LIBS investigations, which include the last planned Aegis location.

Atmospheric and environmental surveys are focusing on the occurrence of clouds, dust and opacities, and we are using DAN instruments to look at the surface. While you might think “as always,” get consistent records to understand patterns, and also know when skews occur. So I don't want to forget them here, just because we're so excited about the new expression of the landscape.

With all this investigation in (electronic) bags, it's time to go back on the road. The next drive is about 20 meters (about 66 feet) and sails around the ridge in front of us, at which point this has changed from a scientific goal to a barrier to the road. After safely maneuvering, the next drive will bring us closer to the next ridge and there are more to the distance. They may even become bigger and more beautiful. Who knows? After all, it's Exploration - heading to places that have not been before without the Wanderers.