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The timestamps printed on the photos in the NASA press release do not correspond to the actual time that the shadow was imaged, rather they represent the "image start time" of a vertically much larger original image. Mars Global Surveyor orbits Mars in a Sun-synchronous polar orbit with orbital period 117.65 minutes, moving from south pole to ...
Observers on Mars can also view lunar eclipses of Phobos and Deimos. Phobos spends about an hour in Mars's shadow; for Deimos it is about two hours. Surprisingly, despite its orbit being nearly in the plane of Mars's equator and despite its very close distance to Mars, there are some occasions when Phobos escapes being eclipsed.
With an altitude of 5,989 km (3,721 mi), Phobos orbits Mars below the synchronous orbit radius, meaning that it moves around Mars faster than Mars itself rotates. [23] Therefore, from the point of view of an observer on the surface of Mars, it rises in the west, moves comparatively rapidly across the sky (in 4 h 15 min or less) and sets in the ...
Both sets of findings support an origin of Phobos from material ejected by an impact on Mars that reaccreted in Martian orbit, [40] similar to the prevailing theory for the origin of Earth's moon. The moons of Mars may have started with a huge collision with a protoplanet one third the mass of Mars that formed a ring around Mars.
The Phobos monolith (right of center, casting long shadow) as taken by the Mars Global Surveyor (MOC Image 55103, 1998). The location of the monolith (HiRISE image PIA10368) The Phobos monolith is a large rock on the surface of Mars' moon Phobos. [1] It is a boulder, about 85 m (279 ft) across and 90 m (300 ft) tall.
(Phobos is about 157 times smaller than Earth’s Moon. Mars’ other moon, Deimos, is even smaller.) The images are the latest in a long history of NASA spacecraft capturing solar eclipses on Mars. Back in 2004, the twin NASA rovers Spirit and Opportunity took the first time-lapse photos of Phobos during a solar eclipse.
Images featured on the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) web site may be copyrighted. The National Space Science Data Center (NSSDC) site has been known to host copyrighted content. Its photo gallery FAQ states that all of the images in the photo gallery are in the public domain "Unless otherwise noted."
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun.The surface of Mars is orange-red because it is covered in iron(III) oxide dust, giving it the nickname "the Red Planet". [22] [23] Mars is among the brightest objects in Earth's sky, and its high-contrast albedo features have made it a common subject for telescope viewing.