NASA Mars Picture of the Day: Lohse Crater Dunes

Mars Global Surveyor Mars Orbiter Camera

MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-965, 8 January 2005

NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

This Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC)
image shows windblown sand dunes in Lohse Crater in
Noachis Terra
near 43.8°S, 16.8°W. The winds responsible
for these dunes blew largely from the lower left (southwest)
toward the upper right (northeast).
The picture covers an area about 3 km (1.9 mi) across,
and is illuminated by sunlight from the upper left.

Malin Space Science Systems and the California Institute of Technology
built the MOC using spare hardware from the Mars Observer mission.
MSSS operates the camera from its facilities in San Diego, California.
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Mars Surveyor Operations Project
operates the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft with its industrial
partner, Lockheed Martin Astronautics, from facilities in Pasadena,
California and Denver, Colorado.