NASA Mars Picture of the Day: Granicus Valles

Mars Global Surveyor Mars Orbiter Camera

MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-606, 15 January 2004

NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

This Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC)
image shows some of the troughs of the Granicus Valles system,
located west of the Elysium volcanic rise
near 27.1°N, 224.0°W. The floors exhibit abundant
large ripple-like features deposited and shaped by wind. The dark
dots on the valley floors are large boulders. The image
covers an area approximately 3 km (1.9 mi) wide;
sunlight illuminates the scene from the 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.