NASA Mars Picture of the Day: Boulder Tracks 07-15-2004

Mars Global Surveyor Mars Orbiter Camera

MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-788, 15 July 2004

NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

The arrows in this
Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC)
picture point to three boulders that left trails behind
them as they rolled down the lower parts of a meteor
crater’s wall. In two cases, the tracks can be resolved
into a series of small depressions, indicating the variable
shape of the boulder as it unevenly proceeded down the slope.
These features are located
near 18.4°N, 120.1°W.
The 75 meter scale bar is about 246 feet long.
Sunlight illuminates the scene from the lower 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.