Spirit is making good progress around Home Plate to the west. After getting clear of troublesome rocks, Spirit drove 13.8 meters (45.3 feet) on Sol 1854 (March 21, 2009).
The next drive, on Sol 1856 (March 23, 2009) , achieved a new distance record for five-wheel driving. Spirit drove 25.82 meters (84.7 feet), beating the old record by about a meter.
Spirit completed another drive of 12.9 meters (42.3 feet) on Sol 1858 (March 25, 2009).
The sol ahead will see the building of the new R9.3 flight software on board the rover. The rover will boot the new software on the subsequent sol.
As of Sol 1858 (March 25, 2009), Spirit's solar array energy production is 233 watt-hours. Atmospheric opacity (tau) remains elevated at 1.15.
The dust factor on the solar array, 0.309, means that 30.9 percent of sunlight hitting the solar array penetrates the layer of accumulated dust on the array. The rover is in good health in spite of dusty skies. Spirit's total odometry is 7,665.02 meters (4.76 miles).
