Date Released: Thursday, December 12, 2002 Malin Space Science Systems MOC Begins Third Mars Year in Mapping Orbit MGS MOC Releases MOC2-321 to MOC2-324, 12 December 2002 The Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) "officially" began its mapping mission on 9 March 1999, after MGS had spent about a year and a half slowly changing its orbit to its final nearly-circular, nearly-polar position approximately 380 km (236 mi) above the martian surface. When mapping began, it was summer in the martian northern hemisphere, and winter in the south. One of the primary objectives of MOC was to observe...