Pit near Arsia Mons
HiRISE PICTURE OF THE DAY: 21 MAY 2024

The Little Pit

This image was acquired to determine if any underlying void (open fracture or normal fault) and associated faults can be observed in this part of Arsia Mons. Pits may reflect geologically-recent tectonic or volcanic activity. Any associated caves could be targets for future robotic exploration. The pit is only a few meters across.



HiRISE Instrument News
Since July 23, 2023, HiRISE observations have lacked data from the RED4 CCD due to a hardware issue, creating a gap in the middle of image products and reducing the color swath to 1 CCD width. We are investigating the hardware issue and may be able to acquire some RED4 data in the future.

Circular Sand Dunes
Sand dunes of many shapes and sizes are common on Mars. In this example the dunes are almost perfectly circular, which is unusual.