While the names Ingenuity and Perseverance belong to NASA's other Mars helicopter and rover, Curiosity decided to borrow their vibes this week - and honestly, it was a whole mood.
The science team pulled off a genuinely impressive feat of robotic contortionism, captured in a time-lapse that shows the rover's arm twisting, bending, and turning while a rock slab was still attached. The goal? Freeing the drill from a target called “Atacama.” Think of it as Mars's most dramatic escape room.
Once the drill was liberated, the team didn't waste a second. They imaged the empty hole with MAHLI, scanned the freshly broken surfaces with Mastcam and ChemCam RMI, and got to work. ChemCam zapped a clean fracture face at “Tamarugal” and “Tamarugo,” then moved on to a light-toned bedrock patch formerly under Atacama at “Colchane.” MAHLI and APXS analyzed sand near “Yerba Loca.” Meanwhile, Mastcam and ChemCam took in the views of the towering buttes above the rover's current and future drive paths, checked out polygonal fractures at “Cerro Elefantes” and “Azul Pampa,” and looked for wind-induced changes in the sand at “Playa los Metales.” ChemCam also performed a passive spectroscopy observation of light-toned features on the “Paniri” butte and checked out a potential meteorite at “Isla Mocha.”
With engineering assessments ongoing, Curiosity drove uphill to study a contact between two rock types - which could indicate a change in formation conditions, a break in time, or both. MAHLI, APXS, and ChemCam teamed up on the lighter-toned, layered “Toro” target and the darker, flaky “Inca de Oro” target. Mastcam planned multiple mosaics capturing different structures and transitions along the contact. Throughout the week, REMS, RAD, and DAN measured the environment above and below the rover, and Navcam and Mastcam teamed up to look for clouds, dust devils, and dust in the atmosphere.
With the drill and arm confirmed healthy by engineers, Curiosity exhibited perseverance (see what they did there?) by heading toward a new workspace with a promising - and larger - block for a new drill attempt. Martian exploration continues, undaunted and apparently unbothered by the planet's best efforts to break things.