[meteorite-list] NASA Orbiter Views Sites of Fiction Film's Mars Landings (MRO)

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2015 16:51:28 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <201510052351.t95NpTl9000786_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=4726

NASA Orbiter Views Sites of Fiction Film's Mars Landings
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
October 5, 2015

Images from a NASA Mars orbiter's telescopic camera reveal details of
real regions on Mars where a new Hollywood movie, "The Martian," places
future astronaut adventures.

The novel of the same name used actual locations on Mars for the landing
sites for its "Ares 3" and "Ares 4" missions. The landing sites for "Ares
3" is on a Martian plain named Acidalia Planitia. The base for the "Ares
4" mission was set inside a crater named Schiaparelli.

Views of these two sites, and other locations pertinent to the fictional
story, are in the latest weekly release of images from the High Resolution
Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance
Orbiter. They are available online at:

http://uahirise.org/martian

Each observation by HiRISE covers an area of several square miles and
shows details as small as a desk. More than 39,000 of them have been taken
since the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter reached Mars in 2006. They are available
online for anyone to explore, from the comfort of home, at:

http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu

The HiRISE team has an online process through which anyone can register
to submit suggestions for sites to be imaged on Mars, at:

http://www.uahirise.org/hiwish

HiRISE has provided important information used in selection landing sites
for NASA's Curiosity Mars rover and other robotic missions. Its observations
will be used during an Oct. 27-30 workshop in Houston for consideration
of landing areas for real future human missions. More information about
the workshop is online at:

http://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/explorationzone2015

HiRISE is operated by the University of Arizona, Tucson. The instrument
was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colorado. The
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, Pasadena, California, for NASA's Science Mission Directorate,
Washington. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology
in Pasadena.

For more information about the MRO, which has been studying Mars from
orbit since 2006, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/mro


Media Contact

DC Agle / Guy Webster 818-393-9011 / 818-354-6278
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
agle at jpl.nasa.gov / guy.w.webster at jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown / Laurie Cantillo 202-358-1726 / 202-358-1077
NASA Headquarters, Washington
dwayne.c.brown at nasa.gov / laura.l.cantillo at nasa.gov

Daniel Stolte 520-626-4402
University of Arizona, Tucson
stolte at email.arizona.edu

2015-309
Received on Mon 05 Oct 2015 07:51:28 PM PDT