Mars Image

Space Imaging ^

[RadioAstronomer]

Space Imaging's IKONOS satellite imaged the planet Mars.

[lafroste]

UHH, WHERE?

[RadioAstronomer]

Think this deserves your ping list?

[RadioAstronomer]

Click the link in the header.

[So Cal Rocket]

[Paul Atreides]

You have to use your imagination. Just picture a planet similar to Arrakis.

[Chad Fairbanks]

Out in Space, silly...

[RadioAstronomer]

You will like this. :-)

[So Cal Rocket]

These two images of Mars were taken by Space Imaging’s IKONOS satellite as the red planet and Earth reached their closest proximity in nearly 60,000 years. At that point which occurred last week, Mars was 34.6 million miles (55.6 million kilometers) away. The first image (left) was taken on Aug. 26, 2003 at 21:40 GMT (3:40 p.m. MDT) as IKONOS came out of the eclipse of the Earth and orbited over our planet’s northern pole. The second image (right) was taken a little more than a half a Martian rotation later on Aug. 27, 2003 at 12:26 GMT (6:26 a.m. MDT). The Martian south polar ice cap is visible at the bottom of both images. The resolution of these images is approximately 67 km. IKONOS takes images of Earth at 1-meter resolution.

Although IKONOS is designed to take images of the Earth, because of its agility, it can look away from Earth and take images of objects in space. Even though Space Imaging doesn’t sell stellar images, it does periodically take images of specific stars in order to calibrate the IKONOS imaging array for luminosity.

[RadioAstronomer]

Thank you :-)

[RadioAstronomer]

A little vanity here! I helped to take this pic. :-)

[Mr. Mojo]

Amazing photo for an earth-orbiting satellite, but we've been spoiled bigtime by closeup shots of the red planet.

[Mr. Mojo]

Good job, RA. Good job indeed.

[RadioAstronomer]

Good job, RA. Good job indeed

Thanks! :-)

[RadioAstronomer]

ping. :-)

[general_re]

Ah, ha. So this is what goes on late at night in the control room when you guys think that nobody's watching.

"Hey, you really wanna take more pictures of the eastern seaboard?"
"Boooriiing. We'll shoot 'em tomorrow night - tell 'em it was a technical glitch or something."
"I'll tell 'em we had sunspots."
"Sunspots is good. What else is there to look at?"
"There's that nude beach in California again."
"Can't - too dark. Nobody'll be there."
"Oh, yeah. Hey, what if we flip it around and shoot some images of Mars?"
"I like it. Now where's that pizza guy, dang it?"

[Jen]

Very nice photos! Thanks for posting this.

[Brett66]

That looks just like what I saw in my telescope when I looked at it. The darker equatorial regions are barely visible in my 4.5" Newtonian, the polar cap is very prominent. It just dawned on me why photos show so many different equatorial regions. You can wait a few hours and Mars will be facing a completely different direction due to it's 24 hr. rotation.

[RadioAstronomer]

"I like it. Now where's that pizza guy, dang it?"

ROTFLMAO!!!!!!!!

[RadioAstronomer]

Your welcome :-)