NASA's Perseverance Mars Rover

Post-drive 4-tile NavCam mosaic looking Northeast after the drive.

The rover has returned to its notional path, having driven away from 'Dox Castle'. The terrain on the path is similar to what we see in this image, so we may encounter a degree of wheel slip and deeper tracks. That will usually result in shorter drives.

I'll post the map and drive data in separate posts

Beautifully processed by James Sorenson. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/James Sorenson

edit: fixed typo

Data provided by JPL shortly after each drive, all I do is gather the data and present it in this table

Waiting for the official distance / elevation change etc. But it looks like a good drive :)

Curiosity is one of only two operating vehicles on all of Mars, half a world away from Jezero crater. So it was a bit unsettling when Perseverance pulled up to a slab of rock after a recent drive and observed freshly made scrape marks.

There was another drive on 1278, oddly reported as 1289 on the mission map. Whichever is correct the distance was 178 meters with a climb of 9 meters

The science team thinks that this rock has a texture unlike any seen in Jezero Crater before, and perhaps all of Mars. Our knowledge of its chemical composition is limited, but early interpretations are that igneous and/or metamorphic processes could have created its stripes. Since Freya Castle is a loose stone that is clearly different from the underlying bedrock, it has likely arrived here from someplace else, perhaps having rolled downhill from a source higher up. This possibility has us excited, and we hope that as we continue to drive uphill, Perseverance will encounter an outcrop of this new rock type so that more detailed measurements can be acquired.

Perseverance rover has reached new heights as it ascends the rim of Jezero crater, currently 389 meters (1277 ft) in elevation higher than the original landing site )! The rover is located at its first crater rim campaign science stop at a location called 'Dox Castle', a region of interest for its potential to host ancient Mars bedrock in the exposed rocks on the rim. Impact craters like Jezero may be the key to piecing together the early geologic history of Mars, as they provide a window into the history of the ancient crust by excavating and depositing deep crustal materials above the surface. Crater rims act as keepers of ancient Martian history, uplifting and exposing the stratigraphy of these impacted materials. Additionally, extreme heat from the impact can encourage the circulation of fluids through fractures similar to hydrothermal vents, which have implications for early habitability and may be preserved in the exposed rim bedrock. With the Perseverance rover we have the potential to explore some of the oldest exposed rocks on the planet.

This panoramic scene is created by processing images and data from the orbiting assets of NASA and ESA, it was processed by Freie Universität Berlin. Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS/University of Arizona/ESA/DLR/FU-BERLIN

Rotation required by Pareidolia ;)

R-MastCam-Z: 110mm (full zoom)

Mast Azimuth: 68.8394

Mast Elevation: -39.732

Sol 1274 (September 20, 2024)

Site: 59.3872

NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS

Raw image: https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020-raw-images/pub/ods/surface/sol/01274/ids/edr/browse/zcam/ZR0_1274_0780039250_863EBY_N0593872ZCAM03981_1100LMJ01.png

Screen shot from : https://mars.nasa.gov/maps/location/?mission=M20

Drive was during September 19, 2024 - Data from JPL

Awaiting the official distance and the updated traverse map.

Looking at the post drive images I presume that we are still on the margin unit, but very close to the basal unit of the crater rim (just beyond the workspace).

JPL stated that "Dox Castle" is a major science waypoint, but we're probably a little south of the location shown on an earlier map, but we are close to the transition zone.

Except for a series of short walkabout drives we could be around here for some time examining the transition between the rim and the rocks formed in the ancient lake. I'll share the official traverse map and drive data as soon as it is released.

Attached is a 9-tile end-of-drive L-NavCam composite, featuring the rover's robotic arm workspace

Size - 3862x2902px

Assembled in MS-ICE.

Site - 96-4812.

Sol 1274 - September 19, 2024.

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Perseverance Mars rover is on its ascent to the rim of Jezero Crater, and it captured a portion of the journey with one of its navigation cameras. Forty-five frames were stitched together to create this video showing the rover's progress on Aug. 22, 25, and 26, 2024, the 1,247th, 1,250th, and 1251st Martian days, or sols, of the mission. During the time period captured, Perseverance covered a distance of about 530 feet (160 meters) and gained about 115 feet (35 meters) in elevation.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/PIA26376

Dox Castle will be our first chance to do rim science, to search for evidence of the transition between the margin and rim materials, and to start piecing together the stratigraphic history of the rocks that make up the rim of Jezero crater.

4-tile end-of-drive NavCam. The terrain in front of the rover (small pebbles) in the sand, is often a good sign of reasonable driving conditions. We're not too far from "Dox Castle" (a possible science waypoint), so we may see the rover change course soon.

Awaiting the post drive data (JSON) and official map

Episode 180 Last month, Perseverance began an epic climb up the rim of Jezero crater to explore new science targets on the outside. After three weeks and ten drives, Perseverance was only about a tenth of the way up. But then something changed.

The climb continues with another good drive/climb during sol 1268. The views from this record elevation are a little spoiled by elevated dust levels. Let's hope the dust subsides a little before the rover drives out of the crater. NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

No, I'm not calling this a "potential biosignature" 😆

Mars Guy has documented some of the rover team's prior work on coated rocks, although I don't remember seeing any examples this visually striking.

The coated rocks which have been documented prior to this one - none of which were nearly so patchy as this one, if I recall correctly - have been interpreted as a relatively thick dust coating formed by the action of water vapor, i.e. humidity. Mars should have had some fairly recent episodes of higher atmospheric moisture caused by the tilting of Mars' axis, which would expose the polar caps to more sunlight and temporarily humidify the atmosphere while the ice is being redistributed to the new polar latitudes.

We've never had any mission climb the rim of a crater as large as Jezero before... not on Mars, or even on Luna... I'd say it's been pretty fun so far!

Screen shots from the official map - https://mars.nasa.gov/maps/location/?mission=M20

Data acquired from JPL's JSON feeds

4-tile NavCam - Looking back downslope after a climb of 20.36 meters (66.8 ft)