Mars Curiosity Rover's First Road Trip Planned

littlesparkvt writes "NASA has announced the first destination for the Curiosity Rover. They're sending it to 'Glenelg,' a natural intersection of three kinds of terrain. 'The trek to Glenelg will send the rover 1,300 feet (400 meters) east-southeast of its landing site. One of the three types of terrain intersecting at Glenelg is layered bedrock, which is attractive as the first drilling target. "We're about ready to load our new destination into our GPS and head out onto the open road," Grotzinger said. "Our challenge is there is no GPS on Mars, so we have a roomful of rover-driver engineers providing our turn-by-turn navigation for us." Prior to the rover's trip to Glenelg, the team in charge of Curiosity's Chemistry and Camera instrument, or ChemCam, is planning to give their mast-mounted, rock-zapping laser and telescope combination a thorough checkout. On Saturday night, Aug. 18, ChemCam is expected to "zap" its first rock in the name of planetary science. It will be the first time such a powerful laser has been used on the surface of another world.'"

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So when the Martians invaded in 1953

[Ralph Spoilsport]

They were only zapping our architecture to see what it was made of?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oVUwG0qC9c [youtube.com]

And watch out for the "claw"!

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

> ChemCam is expected to "zap" its first rock in the name of planetary science.

Take the quotes off that zap and smile when you say it, pal.

If a freakin' robot on Mars shooting a murderous, rock-vaporizing laser doesn't deserve the unquoted use of the verb "zap", nothing does.

Laser

[ByteSlicer]

Did they remember to attach a shark to it? It can't possibly function without one!