Dust Devil Tracks
Many areas on Mars, including the Hellas quadrangle, experience the passage of giant dust devils. A thin coating of fine bright dust covers most of the martian surface. When a dust devil goes by it blows away the coating and exposes the underlying dark surface. Dust devils have been seen from the ground and from orbiting spacecraft. They have even blown the dust off of the solar panels of the two Rovers on Mars, thereby greatly extending their lives. The twin Rovers were designed to last for 3 months, instead they have lasted more than five years and are still going. The pattern of the tracks have been shown to change every few months. A study that combined data from the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) and the Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) found that some large dust devils on Mars have a diameter of 700 meters and last at least 26 minutes.
Read more about this topic: Hellas Quadrangle
Famous quotes containing the words dust, devil and/or tracks:
“We therefore commit his body to the ground; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust; in sure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal life.”
—Book Of Common Prayer, The. The Burial of the Dead (1662)
“Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world.”
—Bible: New Testament, Luke 4:5.
“The tracks of moose, more or less recent, to speak literally, covered every square rod on the sides of the mountain; and these animals are probably more numerous there now than ever before, being driven into this wilderness, from all sides, by the settlements.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)