[meteorite-list] Mars Panorama: Next Best Thing to Being There (MER)

[Ron Baalke]

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2012-196  

Mars Panorama: Next Best Thing to Being There
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
July 05, 2012

PASADENA, Calif. -- From fresh rover tracks to an impact crater blasted
billions of years ago, a newly completed view from the panoramic camera
(Pancam) on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows the ruddy
terrain around the outcrop where the long-lived explorer spent its most
recent Martian winter.

This scene recorded from the mast-mounted color camera includes the
rover's own solar arrays and deck in the foreground, providing a sense
of sitting on top of the rover and taking in the view.  Its release this
week coincides with two milestones: Opportunity completing its 3,000th
Martian day on July 2, and NASA continuing past 15 years of robotic
presence at Mars. Mars Pathfinder landed July 4, 1997. NASA's Mars
Global Surveyor orbiter reached the planet while Pathfinder was still
active, and Global Surveyor overlapped the active missions of the Mars
Odyssey orbiter and Opportunity, both still in service.

The new panorama is online at
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA15689 . It is presented in
false color to emphasize differences between materials in the scene.  It
was assembled from 817 component images taken between Dec. 21, 2011, and
May 8, 2012, while Opportunity was stationed on an outcrop informally
named "Greeley Haven," on a segment of the rim of ancient Endeavour Crater.

"The view provides rich geologic context for the detailed chemical and
mineral work that the team did at Greeley Haven over the rover's fifth
Martian winter, as well as a spectacularly detailed view of the largest
impact crater that we've driven to yet with either rover over the course
of the mission," said Jim Bell of Arizona State University, Tempe,
Pancam lead scientist.

Opportunity and its twin, Spirit, landed on Mars in January 2004 for
missions originally planned to last for three months.  NASA's
next-generation Mars rover, Curiosity, is on course for landing on Mars
next month.

Opportunity's science team chose to call the winter campaign site
Greeley Haven in tribute to Ronald Greeley (1939-2011), a team member
who taught generations of planetary science students at Arizona State
University.

"Ron Greeley was a valued colleague and friend, and this scene, with its
beautiful wind-blown drifts and dunes, captures much of what Ron loved
about Mars," said Steve Squyres of Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.,
principal investigator for Opportunity and Spirit.

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. 

More information about Opportunity is online at:
http://www.nasa.gov/rovers and http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov
<http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov>. You can follow the project on Twitter
at http://twitter.com/MarsRovers and on Facebook at
http://www.facebook.com/mars.rovers .

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

2012-196