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English: Mars' Moon Phobos Eclipses the Sun - viewed by Curiosity Rover, August 20, 2013. This video clip shows the larger of the two moons of Mars, Phobos, passing directly in front of the sun, in an eclipse photographed by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity.
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. Curiosity continued the trend with videos shot by its Mastcam camera system.
A transit of Phobos across the Sun as seen from Mars takes place when Phobos passes directly between the Sun and a point on the surface of Mars, obscuring a large part of the Sun's disc for an observer on Mars. During a transit, Phobos can be seen from Mars as a large black disc rapidly moving across the face of the Sun. At the same time, the ...
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.
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.
Phobos (/ ˈ f oʊ b ə s /; systematic designation: Mars I) is the innermost and larger of the two natural satellites of Mars, the other being Deimos. The two moons were discovered in 1877 by American astronomer Asaph Hall. Phobos is named after the Greek god of fear and panic, who is the son of Ares (Mars) and twin brother of Deimos.
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.
Once in Mars orbit, PADME would carry out 16 flybys of Phobos followed by 9 flybys of Deimos. [5] Flybys would take place at two-week intervals. Flyby altitudes at closest approach to Phobos and Deimos would be ~2 km. [5] Following completion of its primary mission, PADME could remain in high Mars orbit for long-term monitoring of the martian system and search for potential additional moonlets ...