Midnight Sun on Mars, Panorama Mosaic
Panorama mosaic of images was taken by the Surface Stereo Imager on board NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander. This mosaic documents the midnight sun during several days of the mission. The foreground and sky images were taken on Sol 54, or the 54th Martian day of the mission (July 20, 2008). The solar images were taken between 10 and 2 , local solar time, during the nights of sols 46 to 56. During this period of 11 sols, the sun's path got slightly lower over the northern horizon, causing the lack of smoothness to the curve. This pan captures the polar nature of the Phoenix mission in its similarity to time lapse pictures taken above the Arctic Circle on Earth. Phoenix was a robotic spacecraft on a space exploration mission on Mars under the Mars Scout Program. The Phoenix lander descended on Mars on May 25, 2008. Mission scientists used instruments aboard the lander to search for environments suitable for microbial life on Mars, and to research the history of water there. Phoenix was NASA's sixth successful landing out of seven attempts and was the first successful landing in a Martian polar region. The lander completed its mission in August 2008, and made a last brief communication with Earth on November 2 as available solar power dropped with the Martian winter. The mission was declared concluded on November 10, 2008, after engineers were unable to re-contact the craft.
Size: 6600px × 2145px
Photo credit: © Photo Researchers / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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