PIA11209: Full-Circle Color Panorama of Phoenix Lander Deck and Landing Site on Northern Mars, Animation


Full-Circle Color Panorama of Phoenix Lander Deck and Landing Site on Northern Mars, Animation

Caption:

Click here for animation of PIA11209
Click on image to view the animation

This view combines more than 500 images taken after NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander arrived on an arctic plain at 68.22 degrees north latitude, 234.25 degrees east longitude on Mars.

This movie makes a slow tour around highlights of the image including the landscape and the spacecraft's science deck.

The full-circle panorama in approximately true color shows the polygonal patterning of ground at the landing area, similar to patterns in permafrost areas on Earth. The center of the image is the westward part of the scene. Trenches where Phoenix's robotic arm has been exposing subsurface material are visible in the right half of the image. The spacecraft's meteorology mast, topped by the telltale wind gauge, extends into the sky portion of the panorama.

This view comprises more than 100 different Stereo Surface Imager camera pointings, with images taken through three different filters at each pointing. It is presented here as a cylindrical projection.

Background Info:

The Phoenix Mission is led by the University of Arizona, Tucson, on behalf of NASA. Project management of the mission is by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. Spacecraft development is by Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver.

Photojournal Note: As planned, the Phoenix lander, which landed May 25, 2008 23:53 UTC, ended communications in November 2008, about six months after landing, when its solar panels ceased operating in the dark Martian winter.

Cataloging Keywords:

Name Value Additional Values
Target Mars
System
Target Type Planet
Mission Phoenix
Instrument Host Phoenix Lander
Host Type Lander
Instrument Solid-State Imaging (SSI)
Detector
Extra Keywords Color, Movie
Acquisition Date
Release Date 2008-09-30
Date in Caption
Image Credit NASA/JPL-Caltech/University Arizona/Texas A&M University
Source photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA11209
Identifier PIA11209