Recently, the Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) passed over a relatively small impact crater located at latitude 68�N (on the Vastitas Borealis plain, north of Utopia Planitia) and took the picture seen at the left, above.

The curved crater rims are visible in the upper and lower quarters of the image, and the crater floor is visible at the center right.

The picture on the right is a magnified view of the crater rim area outlined by a white box in the image on the left. The bright patches are snow or frost left over from the martian winter.

These snow fields are so small that a human could walk across one of them in a matter of minutes--or perhaps sled down the small, sloping patch that is seen in a shadowed area near the lower left.

In winter, the entire scene shown here would be covered by frost. The long strip at the left covers an area 3 km (1.9 mi) wide by 26 km (16 mi) long. The expanded view on the right covers an area 2.9 km (1.8 mi) by 5.3 km (3.3 mi). Illumination is from the upper right.

Mars Pathfinder: Mission Overview

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SPACEDAILY

Jodrell Bank Plans 200 Klick SETI Search
Manchester - March 23, 1999 -
Project Phoenix, a collaborative research programme between the SETI Institute, the Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico, and the University of Manchester's Lovell radio telescope at Jodrell Bank is using the two telescopes to make the most sensitive and comprehensive search of Sun-like stars within 200 light years of Sol for radio communication signals.