By: pencilnev
License: Copyright, All Rights Reserved

Uploaded: 19 Sep 2020
Last Updated: 19 Sep 2020

130 megapixels
22,348 x 5,819 pixels
74.5 in X 19.4 in at 300dpi

This 360° view from the panoramic camera (Pancam) on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit shows the nearby terrain surrounding the location called "Troy," where Spirit became embedded in soft soil during the spring of 2009. The images combined into this view were taken beginning on the 2,010th Martian day (or sol) of Spirit's mission on Mars (August 28, 2009) and ending on Sol 2089 (November 18, 2009).Troy, the lighter disturbed soil near the center-right in this image, is part of an area called "Scamander Plains," which lies at the edge of a small filled-in crater near the Western edge of Homeplate. Spirit became embedded after the wheels cut through a darker top layer of soil. The composition of different layers in the soil at the site became the subject of intense investigation by tools on Spirit's robotic arm. For scale, the parallel rover tracks are about 1 meter (39 inches) apart. The track on the right is more evident because Spirit was driving backwards, dragging its right-front wheel, which no longer rotates. Three versions of this view are offered at full resolution: an approximate true color rendering generated with Pancam's 601-nm, 535-nm, and 482-nm filters, a false-color, red-green-blue composite generated from Pancam's 753-nm, 535-nm, and 432-nm filters, and a harshly stretched version of the false color mosaic to bring out the subtle color changes in the scene. Spirit has been investigating a region within Mars' Gusev Crater for more than 79 months in what was originally planned as a three-month mission.