Left-eye view of a color stereo pair for PIA11973
Right-eye view of a color stereo pair for PIA11973
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit used its navigation camera to take
the images that have been combined into this stereo, full-circle view of
the rover's surroundings during the 1,843rd Martian day, or sol, of Spirit's surface mission (March
10, 2009). South is in the middle. North is at both ends.
This view combines images from the left-eye and right-eye sides of the
navigation camera. It appears three-dimensional when viewed through
red-blue glasses with the red lens on the left.
The rover had driven 36 centimeters downhill earlier on Sol 1854, but had
not been able to get free of ruts in soft material that had become an
obstacle to getting around the northeastern corner of the low plateau
called "Home Plate."
The Sol 1854 drive, following two others in the preceding four sols that
also achieved little progress in the soft ground, prompted the rover team
to switch to a plan of getting around Home Plate counterclockwise, instead
of clockwise. The drive direction in subsequent sols was westward past the
northern edge of Home Plate.
This view is presented as a cylindrical-perspective projection with
geometric seam correction.