NASA Mars Picture of the Day: Northeast Hellas Landscape

Mars Global Surveyor Mars Orbiter Camera

MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-446, 8 August 2003

NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

This Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) image
of pitted terrain northeast of Hellas Basin shows light-toned
outcrops of layered, sedimentary rock, and a valley floor covered
by large, dark ripples or small dunes. Similar light-toned
sedimentary materials are found throughout the region immediately
northeast of Hellas, and in the crater, Terby.
The area shown is 3 km (1.9 mi) wide and located
near 27.5°S, 281.7°W.
Sunlight illuminates the scene 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.