PIA07256: Meandering Tracks on "Husband Hill"
 Target Name:  Mars
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  Mars Exploration Rover (MER)
 Spacecraft:  Spirit
 Instrument:  Navigation Camera
 Product Size:  7466 x 1096 pixels (w x h)
 Produced By:  JPL
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA07256.tif (5.489 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA07256.jpg (749.9 kB)

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Original Caption Released with Image:

This 360-degree panorama of a section of the "Columbia Hills" shows meandering, crisscrossing wheel tracks that NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit left behind while using its scientific instruments to analyze a new class of rocks in Gusev Crater on Mars. Because Spirit has been experiencing a high rate of slip on the sandy, sloped terrain on this flank of "Husband Hill," scientists are directing the rover to check its progress often to avoid getting a rock stuck in one of its wheel wells.

Rocks in this region are higher in phosphorus than other rocks that Spirit has examined.

This view is a mosaic of frames that Spirit took with its navigation camera during the rover's 358th and 359th martian days, or sols, (Jan. 3 and 4, 2005). It is presented here in a cylindrical projection with geometric seam correction.

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL

Image Addition Date:
2005-01-13