Devon Island, Nunavut, Canada

Agenda
- Complete 24-hour sun-synchronous navigation experiment
- Scout route for extended sun-synchronous navigation experiment
- Schedule completion of field experiment

Status and Progress
- Completed sun-synchronous circuit! At 7:30amCDT, after 24 hours,
Hyperion successfully completed its first sun-synchronous mission. A
complete log of system telemetry (1.2GB) has been recorded and awaits
further analysis. The circuit distance was 6.1km. More than 95% of the
mission was completed autonomously. Teleoperation that did occur upon
indication from Hyperion's health monitor that a fault occurred. In
this traverse the only faults to occur were failure to find a forward
path and laser obstacle detection. No intervention was required by
field observers for safety or any other reason.

- Planned successful mission. The mission began and ended with
Hyperion's batteries fully charged and the robot in position to continue
operation. During the mission Hyperion, in several instances, fell
behind the plan due to the difficulty of the terrain it encountered. In
each case it was able to catch up to the plan when it reached more
benign terrain.

- Avoided obstacles. The ability of the perception/navigation system to
find routes through rubble was very impressive. Numerical analysis will
reveal the thousands of obstacles detected and evaluated, tens of
thousands of steering corrections and the overall statistics of planned
distance and actual navigated distance. Qualitatively, Hyperion wiggled
through some pretty tight spots.

- Scouted route for extended sun-synchronous navigation experiment. We
identified a route encircling Marine Peak a prominent (shadow-casting)
feature on the western end of Von Braun Planitia. This route will
challenge Hyperion with rougher, more steep terrain, 6-8 stream
crossings, and a doubling of the overall distance it must navigate in
24-hours. To better understand the limits of performance, this route
should stress the ability of the sun-synchronous navigation system.

Upcoming
- Begin extended sun-synchronous navigation experiment (weather permitting)

Weather
Early: Sunny. No clouds. High 13C. Winds 5-10kph.
Late: Sunny. No clouds. Low 5C. Winds 10-15kph.

Quote of the Day
"And the final polar bear report of the day ... still no polar bears ... over."