Today marked the first day of the second field campaign at Lava Beds National Monument. The trip from NASA Ames Research Center, the BRAILLE team home base, to LABE was about 6 and a half hours, but the beauty of the national park made the trip well worth it. Along with 15 members of the BRAILLE team came Kathryn Lacey, who will be working hard to prepare meals for the team during the campaign. We appreciate all she has done for BRAILLE, and look forward to her delicious cooking!

As we began testing, we descended into our first lava tube caves using a cable ladder system (shown on the left). Once inside, we prepared the CaveR rover, which we had painstakingly transported from Ames, to collect data. Our foot scientists waited patiently outside to review the rover’s progress. Other BRAILLE team members maneuvered the rover through the cave using a game controller.

Tonight we will head back to our little tent city, which we set up this afternoon in the national park. Looking forward to waking up to a beautiful sunrise tomorrow morning.

If you are interested in following our progress, please check out our instagram where we will be posting regular updates!

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