All of the data returned for the second drill target, called "Lake Orcadie 2," support the decision to attempt to acquire sample at that location using feed-extended drilling. So the weekend plan is focused on drilling, which is planned for the second sol (1982). But first, on Sol 1981, ChemCam and Right Mastcam will observe a potential location for dropping sample in the future and targets named "Ben Nevis" and "Moray." Mastcam will then measure dust in the atmosphere and Navcam will search for dust devils. Later that afternoon, Right Mastcam will look for changes in the sieved and unsieved Ogunquit Beach dump piles, and the ChemCam RMI and Right Mastcam will acquire mosaics of the alluvial fan near the north rim of Gale Crater. Overnight, APXS will integrate on air rather than surface materials to measure the amount of argon in the atmosphere, which is known to vary seasonally based on Mars Exploration Rover APXS data.

Feed-extended drilling dominates the Sol 1982 plan, with only REMS and DAN activities running in parallel. The drill will be retracted from the hole, and Mastcam will take pictures of the hole and the drill bit on Sol 1983. Then the rover will sleep in preparation for more work on Monday. Of course we are all hoping that the drilling goes well--we're looking forward to studying the drill hole and sample!

Today, Sol 1980, we're taking a break from drilling activities to continue with our remote science campaign at our current location. We have three science blocks in today's plan, which we've filled to the brim with a variety of observations. In the early afternoon, we'll use Mastcam to make a multispectral observation on "Lake Orcadie 2," the location of our second intended drill target (which is just to the right of Lake Orcadie, pictured in the Navcam image above). We'll then take a Navcam movie to look for dust devils. Next up is a series of ChemCam LIBS observations to target Lake Orcadie 2, "Black Cuillin," and "St Kilda." Black Cuillin and St Kilda are repeat observations to take a closer look at small-scale features in our workspace. All ChemCam targets will also be documented with Mastcam images. We'll take an additional Mastcam mosaic of the "Dunbar" target to better characterize the stratigraphic stacking of rocks around the rover.

Later in the afternoon we have another science block, during which we'll use ChemCam to take a series of long-distance images of the Peace Vallis fan. After that, we'll take a set of Navcam movies to help us measure the velocity and height of clouds above us.

Our final science block will be first thing in the morning on Sol 1981, which we'll use to carry out some standard ENV observations, including a Mastcam tau, crater rim extinction, and a few Navcam movies.

It is an exciting time for the Curiosity team. Although the drill was able to create a hole, Mars stubbornly refused to let the drill reach a depth where a rock sample could be collected and has driven Curiosity away from "Lake_Orcadie".

Attempting to evade the dreaded impenetrably hard bedrock, a group of dedicated scientists and engineers established a new drill target "Lake_Orcadie2" roughly 7 inches to the right of the first target.

Obsessed with finding a suitable new drill location, Curiosity will thoroughly characterize this new location with APXS and MAHLI after brushing it with the dirt removal tool while also studying the wall and tailings from first drill hole with a ChemCam LIBS raster and Mastcam imaging.

The tactical planning schedule was delayed by 2 hours today so that we would have the latest data from Sol 1977 available for planning. When the data arrived, it quickly became clear that the feed-extended drilling did not complete as planned. However, the new drilling technique was partly successful, producing tailings from up to 1 cm below the surface. So we had to quickly react to this situation, and the Sol 1978 plan is focused on measuring the composition of the fresh drill tailings. This made for an interesting day for me as SOWG Chair!

First, Mastcam will measure dust in the atmosphere by looking at the Sun and the crater rim in the distance. Then Mastcam will acquire a multispectral set of images of the tailings. We don't want to risk disturbing the tailings pile by shooting ChemCam's laser at it, so ChemCam will take passive spectral of the pile instead. ChemCam and Right Mastcam will also observe soil target "Lock Snizort," bright veins at "Melby," and bedrock at "Uig HIlls." After a short nap, the arm will go to work on the drill tailings, taking MAHLI images from 25 and 5 cm above the pile, then placing the APXS for an overnight integration. Finally, the rover will sleep while the operations team decides what to do next.

After a successful drill preload test, Curiosity was primed to drill for the first time in about a year. Unfortunately, due to a light downlink from the Mars Odyssey spacecraft, we didn't get all the images down needed to safely carry out the drill activity in this weekend's plan. Instead, we'll push the drill activity out until we get the needed images down to help ensure it will complete successfully! Until then the view of the arm preload activity provides tantalizing hints of great things to come.

However, just because we couldn't carry out the drill activity as planned, that doesn't mean the team would let the rover sit idle. In fact, quite the opposite. The science operations team immediately started planning backup science activities. The team decided to carry out activities on two contact science targets with MAHLI imaging and APXS chemistry. These targets, dubbed "Rockall" and "Benbecula", will continue to help us characterize the composition and fine-scale textures of the bedrock around our upcoming drill location. These activities will provide valuable geologic context to the drill and help assess the variability of the bedrock in this area. A slew of ChemCam and Mastcam images are also being acquired to further this goal. It won't be long until the other instruments inside the rover body get to sample the fantastic geology of the Vera Rubin Ridge. Stay tuned this coming week for the results of the drill activities. The science team can't wait!

Curiosity has returned to its primary mission of drilling rocks on Mars (at "Lake Orcadie") in an attempt to rescue critical science on the Vera Rubin Ridge from the clutches of vile mechanical failures.

Little does Curiosity know about the secrets of martian history written in the Vera Rubin Ridge, but they will soon be unveiled through the new procedure of feed-extended drilling.

When completed, this incredible technique will illuminate martian history and geology for the small band of scientists and engineers struggling to restore drilling to Mars…

Curiosity is officially go for drilling the "Lake Orcadie" target! After more than a year's wait for the drill to come back online, the rover planners and engineers are confident and ready to proceed with a test of a new drilling method in the coming days.

Because there is only so much data volume and rover power to go around, performing drill activities must temporarily come at the expense of scientific investigations (although you'd be pressed to find a disappointed science team member this week, as the drilling campaign will bring loads of new scientific data!). As a result, with the exception of some environmental observations by the Rover Environmental Monitoring Station (REMS) instrument, today's plan does not have any targeted scientific observations within it. Today will instead be dedicated to drill preload activities and imaging for engineering and rover planning purposes in preparation for a full test of the revised drilling operations.

The name "Lake Orcadie" refers to an ancient lake that was once located in Scotland and is now a series of sedimentary deposits preserved in the geologic record. The Lake Orcadie sediments in Scotland helped geologists to reconstruct the environmental history of the Devonian period on Earth, when fish began to diversify. Considering this target will be the first drill location on Vera Rubin Ridge (VRR), perhaps these new data will help inform us as to what sort of geologic and environmental conditions were present during this time in the history of Gale crater.

Tosol we planned to finish up our suite of observations on the "Ogunquit Beach" sand sample that was off-loaded from the rover over the weekend. As described in yesterday's blog, the rover had dumped two piles of the Ogunquit Beach sample - a pre-sieved and post-sieved portion - on the ground in front of us. Because we spent yestersol observing the pre-sieved dump pile with MAHLI and APXS, we are now ready to blast that pile around with ChemCam's laser, which we will do in today's plan!

We will also continue to collect observations to characterize the bedrock in front of us. We have planned several APXS and MAHLI observations on the area around "Lake Orcadie." The small offsets between these data and previous measurements will enable us to understand small scale variability in the chemistry of the target. We will also take an additional ChemCam LIBS observation and associated Mastcam documentation image of a bedrock target "Peterculler."

Over the weekend, Curiosity successfully off-loaded the sample she acquired previously, the "Ogunquit Beach" sand sample, in preparation for what the science team hopes is acquisition of a new *drilled* rock sample very soon. Curiosity has a sophisticated sample handling and preparation system, known as the Sample Acquisition/Sample Processing and Handling (SA/SPaH, "saw-spa") system. SA/SPaH has the ability to divide a drilled or scooped sample up into different ranges of particle sizes. In the case of the Ogunquit Beach sample, the finest particle size range corresponded to the material that was delivered to both SAM and CheMin. It is known as the post-sieve sample. The larger particle size range material, which was just along for the ride within SA/SPaH, is known as the pre-sieve sample. The first round of MAHLI imaging of both the pre-sieve and post-sieve samples, dumped into separate piles in the workspace, was successful over the weekend, as was the APXS analysis of the post-sieve pile. In today's plan, MAHLI will return to both dump piles for closer approach images to better resolve the fine sand particles in each pile, and APXS will analyze the pre-sieve dump pile. ChemCam will get a turn at the dump piles, acquiring reflectance spectra from the pre-sieve dump pile and a raster over the post-sieve dump pile. ChemCam is kind enough to wait to shoot the dump piles until MAHLI and APXS look closely at them so the pile is not blasted away by the laser! ChemCam will also acquire a raster over the dark gray pebble target "Black Cuillin," which is one of the larger pebble targets strewn among the bedrock in the workspace. Curiosity will squeeze in some looks skyward, measuring dust load in the atmosphere and acquiring movies to look for dust devils.

We got lots of good news this morning: The DRT brushing of the potential drill target completed successfully, as did SAM's recent analysis of the Ogunquit Beach sample, and the rover is healthy and ready for more! So the weekend plan is focused on dumping the last of the Ogunquit Beach sand out of CHIMRA, which is necessary before we can test the new feed-extended drilling technique. But first, on Sol 1968, Navcam will perform a sky survey and search for clouds, as this is the cloudy season on Mars. Then ChemCam and Right Mastcam will observe bedrock targets "Smoo Cave" and "St. Andrews" to sample the nearby chemical diversity. Sol 1969 will be a busy day for MSL, starting with more ChemCam and Right Mastcam bedrock observations, this time of "Yesnaby" and "Dingwall." Then the arm will get to work, taking MAHLI images of the locations where the samples will be dumped, followed by dumping of sieved and un-sieved samples in those two locations. CHIMRA will be cleaned out, then MAHLI will take images of each dump pile from 25 and 5 cm above them. Finally, the APXS will be placed over the pile of sieved material for an overnight integration.

The next morning (Sol 1970), APXS will be retracted so that MAHLI can take another image of sieved material, to see whether and where APXS touched it. Then the arm will be moved out of the way for Mastcam and ChemCam passive spectral observations of the dump piles, and ChemCam LIBS measurements (with Right Mastcam documentation) of red clasts named "Fladda." Just after sunrise on Sol 1971, Mastcam and Navcam will measure the amount of dust in the atmosphere, and Navcam will search for clouds and perform another sky survey. This plan will get MSL through the holiday weekend, and tactical planning will resume Tuesday morning.