Perseverance Rapid Traverse Campaign

Over the first 13 months of the Mars 2020 mission,the Perseverance rover traversed nearly 5 km along the JezeroCrater floor. Near the end of that period, the Science teamwas anxious to relocate to the ancient Delta region near thecrater rim, over 5 km away. A Rapid Traverse Campaign wasplanned that would prioritize use of Perseverance’s autonomousnavigation software to drive at an unprecedented high paceand minimize science activities. The Rapid Traverse Campaignstarted in March 2022 and lasted 31 Martian days. Duringthe campaign, Perseverance drove over 5 km in 24 drives,during which its autonomy software planned 94.8% of its overalldriving, enabling it to set several new planetary rover drivingrecords. Perseverance exceeded the longest daily drive distancerecord achieved by a previous planetary rover (219 meters byOpportunity in 2005) 11 times and set new records for thelongest multi-sol drive distance in a single plan (528.7 meters)and the longest continuation drive record of 699.9 meters byoperating without human drive path input during 3 sols ofdriving. This paper details the planning and execution of theRapid Traverse Campaign.