14 DAY TRIAL // Engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), in Pasadena, California, announced yesterday that the test rover at the facility would undergo a full week of test trials starting next Monday, as the team attempts to discover the best possible methods of getting Spirit unstuck. The Martian rover is stuck in a patch of loose Martian soil and sand, which JPL experts named Troy. Thus far, several types of maneuvers have been tried out, but none of them showed clear signs of promise for freeing Spirit.
“Mars rover team members are planning a long-duration experiment with the test rover at JPL beginning next week. This test will check whether favorable motion seen in earlier tests can be sustained to gain as much distance in the sandbox as Spirit would need to complete on Mars to escape its predicament,” says a press release on the Free Spirit website, which was set up by the Laboratory in an attempt to raise awareness on the rover's situation.
According to the test plans, the replica will be made to drive continuously for about a week, as opposed to recent tests, where it only moved its wheels for 24 hours at a time. During the drive, which on the surface of Mars would cover hundreds of meters, its wheels will change direction several times, so as to see if that helps move it forward. In previous tests, the breaks between runs were used to rearrange the sandbox in a manner that faithfully replicated the actual conditions on Troy.
“Based on test results, the team might begin sending driving commands to Spirit during the second week of September. Any progress by Spirit toward getting out of the soft soil where it is embedded is expected to be slow. With its right front wheel disabled since 2006, Spirit's success at getting out of the sand trap is not guaranteed. Both Spirit and Opportunity have operated on Mars more than five years longer than their initially planned missions of three months,” the release adds.
While efforts back on Earth are raging on, the actual rover is serenely going about its usual activities, sending back large amounts of pictures and telemetric data. Recently, it started doing astronomy, photographing the stars as they are viewed through the Martian atmosphere, and looking at the planet's moons, Phobos and Deimos. Gusts of wind have also cleansed its solar panels, and now, it has more electricity available than ever, which allows it to send back two sets of data per day, rather than the usual one.