EVA # 4
Author: Barbara Braun, Health and Safety Officer
Purpose of EVA: Crew training with small robotic drone
Start time: 12:00 pm
End time: 1:20 pm
Narrative: Trevor, Kristine, and Barbara made their way out the airlock for the drone checkout EVA today at approximately 12:05 pm. With them they brought the crew’s small drone and a tote bag of support equipment. The trio first stowed the spare drone batteries and other equipment in the Spirit rover, and proceeded on foot to an area slightly to the north-northwest of the Hab where they set up the drone for flight. At this point the crew discovered that the drone controller battery was at 28%, and deeming this too low a state of charge to be able to complete the flight safely, the crew connected a battery to the controller to let it charge. While waiting for the controller to charge, the crew took the Spirit and Perseverance rovers to the corner of the road to the Hab and Cow Dung Road in order to pre-stage the rovers at the first drone landing location. The crew proceeded on foot to the location of the mirror sample experiment nearby to check on the integrity of the mirrors, and noted a buildup of salt on one of the mirrors which should provide good data to the experimenters when the mirror is retrieved for examination tomorrow. The crew then proceeded on foot back to the Hab area to check on the state of charge of the controller. The controller had sufficient charge to complete the first flight, so the crew began loading the first flight plan into the drone. The drone SD card then gave an error, but the crew loaded a backup copy of the flight plan and was preparing to launch the drone. At this point mission support called to inquire about the rovers parked at the intersection of the road to the Hab and Cow Dung Road. After consulting with mission support, the team realized that the EVA request did not include sufficient detail about the drone flight plans and the overall plan for the EVA, and the EVA was called off for the day. The crew stowed the drone and its equipment near the Hab airlock and proceeded on foot to retrieve the two rovers. The crew parked the two rovers, noted ending hours and state of charge, left them unplugged, and proceeded into the airlock at 1:15 pm with all equipment.
Destination: Hab, Marble Ritual / mirror deployment location
Coordinates (use UTM WGS 84): 519000, 4251000
Participants: Commander (Kristine Ferrone), HSO (Barbara Braun), Technology Officer (Trevor Jahn)
Road(s) and routes per MDRS Map: Road to the Hab, Cow Dung Rd (0110)
Mode of travel: Rovers and walking