Daily Updates - March 6, 2004
Spirit Status at end of sol 61
After more than a week of camping and field work at "Middle Ground," NASA's Spirit took a few last pictures from there then drove onward to the northeast on sol 61, which ended at 9:51 p.m. Friday, PST. In the martian morning, Spirit's panoramic camera took the final frames needed for the camera team to assemble a full-circle color panorama after all the data reaches Earth.
In the early afternoon, Spirit backed up 0.5 meter (20 inches), then edged forward 0.29 meters (11 inches) to sidestep a rock called "Ingrid." Then the rover advanced 28.5 meters (94 feet) toward its crater-rim destination. The drive took 45 minutes. From the new location, Spirit took forward-looking pictures for use in future drive planning. It also observed the ground and the sky with its miniature thermal emission spectrometer.
For the sol's theme tune in the morning, controllers at JPL played "Motor Away" by Guided by Voices.
Continued driving toward the crater nicknamed "Bonneville" is the plan for Spirit's 62nd sol, ending at 10:30 p.m. Saturday, PST.
Spirit Daily Update Archive