[meteorite-list] Opportunity Studying a Football-Field Size Crater

[Ron Baalke]

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2010-430  

Opportunity Studying a Football-Field Size Crater
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
December 23, 2010

On Dec. 16, 2010, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity reached a
crater about the size of a football field-some 90 meters (295 feet) in
diameter. The rover team plans to use cameras and spectrometers during
the next several weeks to examine rocks exposed at the crater,
informally named "Santa Maria."

A mosaic of image frames taken by Opportunity's navigation camera on
Dec. 16 shows the crater's sharp rim and rocks ejected from the impact
that had excavated the crater.

Opportunity completed its three-month prime mission on Mars in April
2004 and has been working in bonus extended missions since then. After
the investigations at Santa Maria, the rover team plans to resume a
long-term trek by Opportunity to the rim of Endeavour Crater, which is
about 22 kilometers (14 miles) in diameter.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute
of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover Project
for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington. For more
information about the mission, see http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov .

Guy Webster 818-354-6278
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov

2010-430