07-May-2008, 05:31 AM
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Order of Kilopi
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Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 13,364
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Planetary Society Weblog: Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spots dust devils at Phoenix landing site
Quote:
As a part of the weather monitoring campaign, the Context Camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spotted two enormous dust devils, at the dead center of the Phoenix landing ellipse.
[...] if the landing site selection committee has done its work well, the landscape should be mind-numbingly flat and devoid of large rocks. The flatness means we should see a long way, but see a whole lot of nothing. I'm envisioning west Texas without vegetation. I'm not looking forward to the underwhelmed response to the landscape from the mainstream media.
But if that flat flat flat landscape occasionally contains kilometer-high dust devils, Phoenix should be able to spot them from miles away [...]
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Pictures there.
NASA Phoenix: Multimedia Feature: Phoenix Landing Area Viewed by Mars Color Imager:
Quote:
An annotated version of the image indicates the location of the landing ellipse, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) long. The Context Camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took an image of the landing area at the same time the Mars Color Imager took this image. A dot within the landing ellipse marks the location of two active dust devils visible in the Context Camera image, PIA10633.
When the Mars Color Imager acquired this image, the season in Mars' northern hemisphere was late spring. A few weeks earlier, the Phoenix landing site was still covered with seasonal frost left over from the previous winter.
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NASA Phoenix: Multimedia Feature: Context Camera Spots Dust Devils at Phoenix Landing Site
Planetary Photojournal: PIA10634: Phoenix Landing Area Viewed by Mars Color Imager
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Landing time (approximate):
Sunday, May 25, 1636 PDT
Sunday, May 25, 1936 EDT
Sunday, May 25, 2336 UTC
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