MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-207, 11 February 2000
Earlier in 1999, MGS MOC saw another valentine heart, but instead of a mesa, the feature was expressed as a pit. You can view that image by CLICKING HERE.
Note added 1:45 p.m. PST, 11 February 2000:
If the heart looks
to you like it is a pit (negative relief) rather than a mesa (positive relief),
that is because there are two effects that make this a challenging object to
see. Sunlight illuminates the heart from the lower left, thus the lower left
wall of the heart looks bright because it is reflecting this sunlight. The
problem here is frost. Some very small amounts of residual frost are seen on the
slopes facing away from the sunlight (toward the lower right and toward the
top). MOC images in the martian polar regions can sometimes fool the eye because
a frosted slope might at first glance seem to be a sunlit slope. This picture
was taken in late southern spring in a region that spends each winter and most
of each spring completely buried in bright frost.
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, CA. 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, CA and Denver, CO.
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