NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit used its navigation camera to take
the images that have been combined into this 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 is presented as a polar projection with geometric seam correction. North is at the top.
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.