Mars: Global mosaic centered on Valles Marineris | vo1_mg07s078 | ||
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Mosaic
of the Valles Marineris hemisphere of
Mars projected into point perspective, a view similar to that which one
would see from a spacecraft. The viewer's distance is 2,500 kilometers from
the surface of the planet. The mosaic is composed of 102 Viking Orbiter
images of Mars. |
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Image Credit: NASA; Image Processing by Jody Swann/Tammy Becker/Alfred McEwen, using the PICS (Planetary Image Cartography System) image processing system developed at the U.S. Geological Survey in Flagstaff, Arizona. | |||
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Mosaic of the Valles Marineris hemisphere of Mars projected into point perspective, a view similar to that which one would see from a spacecraft. The viewer's distance is 2,500 kilometers from the surface of the planet. The mosaic is composed of 102 Viking Orbiter images of Mars. The center of the scene (lat -7, long 78) shows the entire Valles Marineris canyon system, over 3,000 kilometers long and up to 8 kilometers deep, extending from Noctis Labyrinthus, the arcuate system of graben to the west, to the chaotic terrain to the east. Many huge ancient river channels begin from the chaotic terrain and north-central canyons and run north. Many of the channels flowed into a basin called Acidalia Planitia, which is the dark area in the extreme north of this picture. | ![]() |
The
three Tharsis volcanoes (dark red spots), each about 25
kilometers high, are visible to the west. South of Valles Marineris is
very ancient terrain covered by many impact craters.
The global mosaic uses 102 Viking 1 Orbiter images of Mars that were taken on orbit 1,334, 22 February 1980. |
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