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Spectacular New Martian Impact Crater Spotted From Orbit

New submitter kc123 writes: "The team that runs the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has released a photo showning a new impact crater on Mars, formed sometime early this decade. The crater at the center is about 30 meters in diameter, and the material ejected during its formation extends out as far as 15 kilometers. The impact was originally spotted by the MRO's Context Camera, a wide-field imaging system that provides the context—an image of the surrounding terrain—for the high-resolution images taken by HiRISE. The time window on the impact, between July 2010 and May 2012, simply represents the time between two different Context Camera photos of the same location. Once the crater was spotted, it took until November of 2013 for another pass of the region, at which point HiRISE was able to image it." Reader astroengine adds some more Mars news: "On Thursday at 3:41 p.m. EST (20:41 UTC), Mars rover Curiosity beamed back a photo from its rear hazard avoidance camera (Hazcam). In the shot we see wheel tracks in the downward slope of the dune bridging "Dingo Gap" with the peak of Curiosity's eventual goal, Mount Sharp, on the horizon. This can mean only one thing; the one-ton robot has successfully conquered its first Mars dune! Curiosity has also taken a picture of Earth."

6 of 99 comments (clear)

  1. Whoops! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Wrong link!

  2. Obliterate the Beta by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Please post this to new articles if it hasn't been posted yet. (Copy-paste the html from here so links don't get mangled!)

    On February 5, 2014, Slashdot announced through a javascript popup that they are starting to "move in to" the new Slashdot Beta design. Slashdot Beta is a trend-following attempt to give Slashdot a fresh look, an approach that has led to less space for text and an abandonment of the traditional Slashdot look. Much worse than that, Slashdot Beta fundamentally breaks the classic Slashdot discussion and moderation system.

    If you haven't seen Slashdot Beta already, open this in a new tab. After seeing that, click here to return to classic Slashdot.

    We should boycott stories and only discuss the abomination that is Slashdot Beta until Dice abandons the project.
    We should boycott slashdot entirely during the week of Feb 10 to Feb 17 as part of the wider slashcott

    Moderators - only spend mod points on comments that discuss Beta
    Commentors - only discuss Beta
      http://slashdot.org/recent - Vote up the Fuck Beta stories

    Keep this up for a few days and we may finally get the PHBs attention.

    -----=====##### LINKS #####=====-----

    Discussion of Beta: http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&id=56395415

    Discussion of where to go if Beta goes live: http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&type=submission&id=3321441

    Alternative Slashdot: http://altslashdot.org (thanks Okian Warrior (537106))

  3. Working link by djupedal · · Score: 4, Informative
  4. Correct Link by Muad'Dave · · Score: 1, Informative
    --
    Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
  5. discussion at altslashdot.org is interesting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    We should think of the Beta as a great opportunity : we get to diss a bunch of corporate asshats and build a community site we love.

    altslashdot needs a kickstarter fund that gives us founders stock and owner-voter power in exchange for contributions.

  6. Re:Only in Government does "last decade" = "new" by amicusNYCL · · Score: 3, Informative

    "Early this decade" is not the same as "last decade". The impact happened between 2010 and 2012. That could make it less than 2 years old. On a geologic scale, that is most definitely "new". It's certainly not "old".

    --
    "Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black