“Yeah, I see it.”
“Good morning, Pathfinder, how are we feeling today?”
Gabe chuckled. “I know where you got that line from.”
“So do I.”
“But you’re not really a space cowboy.”
“I’m more of a space cowboy than you are. At least I’m a boy.”
Gabe punched him in the shoulder.
“Ouch.”
She pulled up alongside the Pathfinder lander and stopped.
Jeff keyed his radio. “Abby?”
“Yeah. What’s up?”
“Okay, we just arrived at Pathfinder, where are you?”
“We’re in the ravine.”
“Oh yeah? What’s it like?”
“Rocky. Think of the HiRISE images of the north end of the Morava Valles.”
“Eeew.”
“It’s not that bad, mostly just big sheets of bedrock. You just have to avoid the drop-offs, crevices, and potholes. Otherwise, it’s a walk in the park.”
“Okay, I’ll take your word for it. We’re gonna start disassembling this thing. See you in a couple hours.”
“Roger that.”
Jeff and Gabe detached from Amos’ life support system and plugged into their PLSSs. While Gabe folded antennas, Jeff began unbolting Pathfinder’s ‘head’ from the landing stage. The head contained the radios, antennas, batteries, and RTG power supply. The landing stage contained the rocket motors, fuel tanks, and landing legs, and was no longer needed as Abby and Susan had a lightweight support tower for the head with them. Once separated from the landing stage Gabe and Jeff carefully set the head in the rover’s bed and securely strapped it in place. On Earth, the lander’s payload section weighed 230 pounds, and would have been too much for just the two of them to handle. But on Mars it only weighed 87 pounds, and was manageable.
“Okay, Gabe, that looks good. Let’s go.”
“Rog.”
They climbed back into the rover, reattached to its life support system, and headed south.”
“Abby?” said Jeff.
“Yeah, I’m here, I was just about to call you.”
“Oh yeah? We’ve got Pathfinder in back and are on our way. Where are you?”
“We’re there.”
“There? There, where?”
“At the north end of the ridge, about two klicks south of that little crater on the east rim of Frying Pan.”
“Oh, okay. You made good time.”
“Yeah, it’s wasn’t too bad to here, and from here on should be a piece of cake; it’s all sand, just like the north end of those HiRISE images of the volcano. Low dunes running north-south, about five to ten meters apart; shouldn’t be bad at all.”
“Excellent.”
“You want us to run on up there and pick a spot?”
“Sure, go ahead. It’s about 25 klicks, so it’ll probably take us an hour, hour and a half, to get there. We’ll ease out through the south pass in this ridge and then just follow your tracks.”
“That’s the long way around. We took a detour and followed the canyon all the way to Frying Pan, then backtracked up here. Unless you want to go sightseeing, you can probably save six or eight kilometers by skipping that part. When you get to the bend in the canyon where it turns southwest, just go straight and head for the ridge.”
“Is it worth seeing?”
“Oh yeah! That valles cuts right through the ejecta and runs straight into the crater, then abruptly drops off about 500 meters. We took some pictures and a few samples. It’s weird, it sure looks like it was cut by water, but whether the water was flowing in or out is hard to say.”
“I think it had to be flowing in,” said Susan. “The rim and face of the crater show significant signs of erosion.”
As Jeff and Gabe rumbled south alongside the 100-meter high escarpment that formed the west wall of the valley, he mentally scratched his chin. “Yeah, okay, but how do you explain all the erosion on the west side of the crater? That east side is 500 meters above everything around, including the west side of the crater. Water doesn’t flow uphill.”
“Multiple events? Suppose that eons ago the terrain here was somewhat different. For example, suppose that at the time of the impact that created the crater, this area from the volcano all the way over to the hills on the west side of the crater was one continuous mountain range, and supposing the entire Basin, except for that range of volcanic peaks was inundated.”
“And the impact created something akin to Crater Lake in Oregon?”
“Right. And water breeched the ejecta on the east side and filled up the lake.”
“Okay, I’ll buy that. Then what happened?”
“The big bang.”
“You mean the Vastitas Borealis impact?”
“Yes, and chaos ensued. Mile-high walls of water rushing in every which direction eventually ate a channel through this volcanic range, and drained the crater lake through the west side, either north into the Basin proper or south into the Loire Valles, and then around to the Morava Valles, on up into what is now the Iani Chaos, and on into Ares Vallis.”
“Makes as much sense as anything.”
“That valley running into Frying Pan is over ten kilometers long, is at some points the better part of two kilometers wide and, over a hundred meters deep! That’s like a stretch of the Mississippi River, and then some. And it doesn’t even have a name. This place is incredible.”
Jeff laughed. “Now aren’t you glad you came? You guys probably did more exploration and research this morning than the MSL did in two years.”
“Yeah. Wow.”
“Anyway,” said Abby, “Jeff, it’s only a day trip, so you might want to skip it today and come back another time.”
“Gotcha. Okay, we’ll take the bypass and see you in an hour or so. When you get up there, make sure you’ve got line-of-sight with the station.”
“Will do.”
“And then why don’t you guys look around for a nice sidewalk bistro and we’ll do lunch.”
There was a brief pause, followed by a laugh. “Um, are we on the same planet?”
“Yeah, right. Okay, let’s just try and get home by suppertime.”
“Rog.”
Fifteen minutes later, Gabe eased through the narrow south pass of the valley’s west ridge into the adjoining valley that led to Frying Pan crater, and they intercepted Andy’s tracks. “I guess we can pick up the speed a bit.”
“Yeah,” said Jeff. “Just keep your eyes on the road and watch for rocks.”
“And what are you going to watch for?”
“Oh, I’m just gonna sit back and take in all this pastoral scenery.”
“You’ll let me know if you see anything… pastoral?”
“Yeah.”
Half an hour, 8.5 kilometers, and a slow climb up the hill, and they found themselves alongside the massive 500-meter-high rugged butte comprising the brunt of what remained of Frying Pan’s meteorite impact ejecta. Gabe stopped. “Wow, that is some rock.”
“Yeah. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think I’d want to have to climb that south face.”
“No. Once you get past the rubble at the base, that has to be nearly 400 meters vertical.”
“Abby?”
“Yeah.”
“We’re at the bend in the river, where are you?”
“We’re on top, in the center of the ridge on a knoll about two and a half klicks south of the minus 750-meter MOLA contour. About 500 meters south of an east-west string of three small craters.”
Gabe chimed in. “I know the spot. Can you see the station?”
“Yeah. Looking at it through the binoculars right now. You guys have got to see this view, it’s incredible. To the northwest is Frying Pan, to the east the Loire Chaos, to the south the Loire Valles, and to the southwest the confluence of the Loire and Samara.”
“Roger that,” said Jeff, “we’re on our way. Probably be another half hour.”
“Take your time, we�
��re having fun and keeping busy. I’m taking pictures and Sue’s collecting samples. She found a reasonably fresh little crater – about ten meters across – and she’s down in it trying to dig out some bedrock, see what this hill is made of. Oh, and I’ve got Andy taking a panorama with the Mastcam.”
“Alright, sounds good. See you in a bit.”
They crested the knoll and pulled to a stop alongside Andy. Jeff switched their VOX comms to Abby and Susan’s channel, connected to his PLSS, and climbed out. “Hi, we’re here. I see what you mean about the view. Wow.”
Gabe climbed out, walked around the rover, and stood beside Jeff. “Oh my god! The Loire Chaos. That’s unbelievable.”
“Yeah. Quite the geologic train wreck, isn’t it?”
“Uh huh. Hundreds of square kilometers of football-stadium sized boulders. Good god!”
“I think some them are a lot bigger than that. Some of those cliff faces have to be a couple hundred meters. And can you imagine what the Iani or Aureum Chaos looks like? Ten thousand times bigger?”
“Not really, it’s beyond my imagination. We need to figure out how to get down in there.”
“We will, but not today. Come on, let’s turn to. It’ll take us a couple hours to get this set up, and a couple hours to get back. I’d like to be back before dark. This site meet with your approval?”
Gabe looked around. “Yes, should be fine.”
“Alright then. Abby, Sue? You want to set up the tower, and we’ll unpack the head?”
An hour later they had the six-foot-tall tower assembled and leveled and the Pathfinder communications head seated atop it. “Okay,” said Jeff, “while Gabe and I get this thing bolted in place and the antennas aligned, Abby, Sue, why don’t you two take Andy and run on out the ridge – it’s only four or five klicks – and get some pictures and slope measurements of the other side where it runs down into the valles. We can take a look at them later and see if we can plot a route down into the valles from this side, and back up into the chaos.”
“Roger that,” said Abby.
“Don’t take too long, we’re burnin’ daylight.”
“On our way.”
Jeff and Gabe finished assembly, then Gabe took several bearings to features of known location with a pelorus affixed to the tower just below the comm head. Then she calculated exact position and the site azimuth, and programmed it, along with the elevation, into the antennae alignment computer. Two of the head’s three high gain antennas immediately slewed around and aligned with the orbiter and the station. “Okay,” she said, “reading five by five on all bands.”
“Excellent. Try Andy?”
“Alright.” She keyed ‘Andy’ for a search with the third, uppermost antennae. Pathfinder’s RDF, or Radio Direction Finding, antenna quickly began rotating, searching for a VHF carrier from Andy, and locked in. Then the high gain antenna slewed to the south, and pointed along the ridge in the direction that Abby and Sue had gone.
Jeff chuckled. “Outstanding! Sue, come up on Ka-band.”
“Okay, just a second.”
He switched Amos’ comm relay to Ka-band, and had the rover align its high gain antenna with the Pathfinder head. “Sue? How do you read on Ka?”
“Loud and clear.”
“Excellent. Where are you?”
“We just crested the top. We’ve got a great view of the chaos, but can’t see all the way to the bottom of the valles. There’s a bluff that runs around the southwest side of the volcano that’s blocking our view. I’m guessing it’s about four kilometers below us, but the terrain and slope don’t look bad.”
“Rog. Uh, don’t go down there, no time. Just get what you can and get on back here, we need to get going pretty soon.”
“Copy.”
Gabe fiddled with Amos’ video display, and slewed the Mastcam around to the northeast.
“What are you looking at?”
“Trying to see if I can get any kind of image of the rims on the big craters.”
He glanced at the display. “Kind of hazy. Springtime on Mars, ‘tis the season.”
“Yes. Well, let’s hope it’s not that kind of season.”
“Yeah, really. Uh, try infrared.”
She switched modes on the camera. A black and white image appeared on the screen.
“Ugh. Not much better.”
“The sun’s in the wrong place, there’s not much thermal contrast. It’d be better at night.”
“Yeah, well, we’re not gonna wait around for it. At least not today.”
“Oh, look.” She pointed to the screen. “That look like foothills to you?”
“Uh huh, sort of.”
“Let me check the azimuth. Yeah, that’s the right direction.” She brought up a topographical map on the second display. “That’s the foothills just to the southwest of the smaller crater of the big three.”
“Okay, cool. So we’ve got line-of-sight.”
“Oh yeah, that’s only about 50 kilometers. From up here we should have line-of-sight of at least 80 kilometers farther to the northwest looking into the Basin.”
“Very good.” Jeff keyed his radio. “Abby?”
“Yeah?”
“From where you are can you see west up the valles to the confluence?”
“Yeah.”
“Can you see those two peaks on the west side of Frying Pan?”
“We can see the southern one. The northern one is blocked by that ejecta peak on the southwest side of Frying Pan.”
“Can you see that notch on the south end of that range?”
“Not the notch itself, but the east face of it.”
“Good. Can you get some pictures of that?”
“Already did.”
“Excellent. You about done?”
“Yeah, we’ll be starting back in just a couple minutes.”
“Okay. Well, we’re done here, I think, and are gonna head home. Meet you at the barn.”
“Rog.”
#
Jeff parked Amos beside the station, reconnected to his PLSS, and slowly climbed out. “Oh my god, eleven hours in this damn suit. I don’t know about you, but I’m beat.”
“Yeah,” said Gabe.
It was about an hour before sunset and the sky was gradually turning from pink to indigo. “When do you think we’re going to break the EVA record?”
Gabe sighed as she stumbled toward the airlock. “I don’t know. It’s currently held by Anatoly Solovyev, around 82 hours. At the rate we’re going, probably day after tomorrow. And we’ve only been here for a week.”
Thursday, October 13, 2016
MSD 50757.359 (Sol 7)
Jeff poured a cup of coffee and took a seat at the breakfast table. As he spooned scrambled eggs and sausage on his plate, he gave Susan a broad smile. “Happy birthday.”
She returned the smile. “Thank you. Kind of you to remember.”
“You’re welcome. Have any special plans for the day?”
“I was thinking of going to the mall and doing a little shopping, but it’s kind of a long drive.”
Jeff chuckled. “Yeah.”
“So, no, nothing special.”
“Well, if you’d like to go on a little drive, we can go find the tractor and greenhouse, and get started on that project.”
“Sure.”
He glanced at Gabe and Abby. “That alright with you two?”
They both nodded. “Yeah, fine,” said Gabe. “I’m looking forward to getting the greenhouse setup and start doing some gardening.”
“Okay, let’s suit up after breakfast and go find ‘em.”
“I know where they are.”
“You do?”
“Uh huh.”
“How?”
Gabe grinned. “Now that Pathfinder’s on high ground, I was able to get a bearing and Doppler range on their beacons last night. They’re actually pretty close together, about three kilometers apart. But they overshot the LZ by around 15 kilometers. They’re roughly 28 kilometers no
rtheast of us, in the foothills between here and the big crater. The hills to the east of Pathfinder’s landing site blocked its view as they came in, so all it knew was that they were somewhere out there in about a 700 square kilometer area. That’s why Amos and Andy couldn’t find them.”
“Huh. I’ll be damned. Well, they’re a ways away, but since we’re going to be visiting that crater this’ll also give us an opportunity to chart at least half the route to it.”
“Uh huh.”
Four hours later they found the tractor. The compact track loader was built by Mitsubishi in Japan with engineering assistance from Caterpillar and JPL, and launched from China’s Wenchang Satellite Launch Center on Hainan Island atop a Long March 5. Big Jake, as it was affectionately called, weighed in at just over three and a half tons and was the largest single mass landed on Mars to date – which the Chinese government spared no expense in bragging about. In addition to its loader, it also was provided with optional quick-coupling auger, backhoe, and angled blade. The crew hoped to use it to “dig into” Mars and see what was up to ten feet beneath the planet’s surface. Additionally, they hoped to sample a variety of Martian soil types in the greenhouse, searching for something that could serve as a growth medium with only minimal treatment. Like the rovers, Amos and Andy, Big Jake was powered by a CO/LOX burning engine, and was fitted with an RTG to keep the batteries charged and its hydraulics from freezing for up to 25 years. Being tracked, it was capable of traversing much more difficult terrain than the rovers, but it was slow, with a maximum speed of only seven miles per hour, and a maximum un-refueled range of only 50 kilometers. Further, it was “dumb.” Big Jake possessed no navigation, no intelligence, and zero autonomous operation capability: it had but one mode – manual.
Jeff looked the machine over. “Well, it made it.”
“Amazing,” said Gabe. “I was almost certain we’d find its mangled remains at the bottom of a very fresh crater.”
Jeff laughed. “Yeah, you’re not the only one. Sue? You want to climb in and see if it’ll start.”
“Roger that.” She climbed into the cab, not the simplest of tasks while wearing a Mark III suit and PLSS, settled in, and cranked the starter. Big Jake fired up. “We’re running.”
Margaritifer Basin (Margaritifer Trilogy Book 1) Page 77
