NASA Mars Picture of the Day: Rush Hour
Mars Global Surveyor Mars Orbiter Camera
MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-1514, 5 July 2006
 NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems |
| This Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) image shows a cratered plain west of Schiaparelli Crater, Mars. The area captured in this image, and areas adjacent to it, are known for high dust devil traffic and the day this image was acquired in March 2006 was no exception. Near the top of the image, diagonally from the large impact crater cut by the left (west) edge of the image, there is a large dust devil traversing the plain and casting a shadow to the east. Also, near the bottom of the image, a smaller dust devil, is working its way across the plain. |
| Location near: 5.9°S, 349.2°W |
| Image width: ~3 km (~1.9 mi) |
| Illumination from: upper left |
| Season: Southern Autumn |
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.
