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Mars Global Surveyor
Mars Orbiter Camera

Weepy Crater

MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-1552, 12 August 2006

Medium-sized view of MGS MOC Picture of the Day, updated daily
NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

This Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) image shows gullies—all of which head at the same level—on a south mid-latitude crater wall. At the 6 meters (~20 feet) per pixel scale at which this image was obtained, the gullies almost appear as if they are the product of a "weeping layer," a porous layer of rock through which a liquid such as water may have percolated until it came to the martian surface at this crater wall, then flowed downslope, toward the crater floor.
Location near: 34.0°S, 208.4°W
Image width: ~3 km (~1.9 mi)
Illumination from: upper left
Season: Southern Autumn


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Malin Space Science Systems and the California Institute of Technology built the MOC using spare hardware from the Mars Observer mission. MSSS operates the camera from its facilities in San Diego, California. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Mars Surveyor Operations Project operates the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft with its industrial partner, Lockheed Martin Astronautics, from facilities in Pasadena, California and Denver, Colorado.

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