Opportunity Status Report, September 8, 2017: Opportunity is continuing the winter exploration of “Perseverance Valley” on the west rim of Endeavour Crater.
Winter is constraining the available energy, so the project has the rover doing “hops” (drives) from one energy-favorable “lily pad” to the next. (These lily pads are locations where the terrain is tilted sufficiently to the north to maximize the Sun illumination on the rover’s solar panels.)
At these lily pad locations, Opportunity has been conducting an extensive stereo survey of the morphology (form and shape) of “Perseverance Valley.” These data will be combined from throughout the valley to generate a complete digital elevation model that scientists will use to address questions about the valley’s formation and origin. But even with the favorable lily pads, the rover still has to spend some days recharging where to rover only wakes briefly for communication and sleeps the rest of the day. (…)
Total odometry is 27.97 miles (45.02 kilometers). [More at link]