Today's report discusses the crew EVA planning of Segment 1 of the Lith Canyon EVA. I have included both planning days, May 3 and 4, because time didn't allow me to write a report yesterday. I hope that putting this in one report might actually be beneficial to the reader, because it will show the workflow process and collaboration between the crew and the RST over two days.

May 3: Crew Initial Planning of Segment 1 for Lith Canyon EVA:

In the afternoon of May 3rd, the crew had an hour-long initial EVA planning meeting. In this meeting the crew had two objectives, 1) they had to review the available data for Lith Canyon and based on that define a doable EVA plan for next day's EVA, and 2) they wanted to provide the RST with as good a background picture of Lith Canyon and the EVA plans in the coming three days as possible. In order to support the second objective, the crew decided again to record the meeting on video, in order for a MeetingReplay to be created for the RST. The crew started the meeting with the creation of an aerial map with and explanation of Lith Canyon (See Figure 1).

Figure 1. Crew Explanation of Lith Canyon aerial map - (Click for Detail)

Using this map, the crew explained to the RST how they divided Lith Canyon in three segments, and how there are two EVAs planned to geologically investigate the three segments, The next day's EVA would only be covering Segment 1, while the EVA after that would cover both Segment 2 and 3 in one EVA. The scale of the aerial image in Figure 1 is 1 meter per pixel making Lith Canyon about 600 meters long.

After the introduction of Lith Canyon to the RST, the crew focused on what they would be doing in next day's EVA. To do this, the crew had created a hand drawn map of Segment 1, that included hand drawn GPS WayPoints for Boudreaux (the robot) and for the crew to be aware of. Figure 2 shows this hand drawn map.

Figure 2. Crew hand drawn map of Segment 1 of Lith Canyon - (Click for Detail)

The crew's plan was to investigate Segment 1 by entering the canyon from Fossil Hill (i.e. WayPoint 5). During the investigation of Segment 1, Boudreaux is to be commanded by Astronaut One (AstroOne) to move to WayPoints1 through 3 in order to, a) provide wireless communication relay back to HabCom while at the bottom of the canyon and b) providing video feed and images of the astronauts in the canyon. To allow for total coverage in the canyon, the crew has devised three WayPoints at the edge of the head of the canyon. WayPoint1 is a position for Boudreaux to cover the astronauts while they are descending into the canyon, as well as when they are working on the right side of the canyon (from Figure 2's perspective). WayPoint2 is a position for Boudreaux to cover the astronauts when they are working on the left side of the canyon (from Figure 2's perspective), while WayPoint3 is a position for Boudreaux for when the astronauts are in the center of the canyon and moving towards the end of Segment 1 (referred to as 'the Ledge'). The astronauts are able to command Boudreaux to move to either of these waypoints at their will.

Figure 3. Crew's initial planning map in Compendium - (Click for Detail)

The crew ended the meeting with discussing how to proceed during the Segment 1 EVA. Some of this was captured in the Compendium map shown in Figure 3, although the majority of the discussion was done using the maps of Figure 1 and Figure 2. It was therefore very important for the RST to be able to view the MeetingReplay.

May 4: Crew RST Debrief Review and Final Planning of Segment 1 for Lith Canyon EVA:

As planned, the morning was used to setup communications to Lith Canyon. During this the crew had time to develop the final EVA plan. One of the first things we noticed when we woke up was that the crew downlink lead had made a mistake in the filenames of the downlinked video files the night before (the RST had e-mailed the crew). The result was that the RST was unable to create the MeetingReplay before their actual SOWG meeting early in the morning. Here is an excerpt of the e-mail communication from the Crew Downlink Lead back to the RST:

"As I am making our coffee, I am beating myself up over this issue. I cannot believe I made this mistake […]. After a couple of minutes I came to the answer, and I think it is an important one to keep in mind for the future. Exhaustion is setting in. We are all starting to become extremely tired […]. So, my conclusion is that, although downlinking these videos seems a simple process with only a few simple steps, it comes only as a last step in a whole slew of processes that start after an exhausting day in the 90 degree sun. A crew on Mars is surely going to make the same mistake. This is another example of why simple personal agents that help you automate these tasks and remove the possibility of these stupid mistakes."

It is important to realize that no matter how simple procedures might be, if something can go wrong, they will at one point or another. This again shows how our development and field-test methodology helps in determining requirements from a human-centered perspective.

The RST was able to generate the MeetingReplay later in the day and the RST was able to review the crew's initial planning. Figure 4 is a screenshot of the MeetingReplay of the crew's initial planning meeting.

Figure 4. MeetingReplay of Crew's Segment 1 Lith Canyon EVA Planning - (Click for Detail)

Even though the MeetingReplay had essential information from the crew. The fact that the crew downlinks their Compendium map in ScienceOrganizer so that the RST can review the crew's mapped discussion, allowed the RST to provide at least some feedback to the crew for its final EVA planning session during the morning of May 4. Figure 5 shows the e-mail feedback from the RST in the morning of May 4th. The crew was able to take all the RST suggestions in consideration before they created the final EVA plan.

Figure 5. RST e-mail feedback brought into Compendium by the crew - (Click for Detail)

Weather prevented us from performing the EVA today (see Commander report), and it is again shown that it is better to have the data available for the RST to review later on, than not have the data available at all. The RST was able to review the MeetingReplay and provide further feedback to the crew at the end of the day. The crew will use this feedback in tomorrow's retry of the Segment 1 of Lith Canyon EVA.