* Astronomy

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RE: Mars Dust Devil

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A Spirit panorama on Sol 620 to 622 taken from the summit of Husband hill overlooking Gusev crater.

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This movie clip shows several gusts and whirlwinds carrying dust as they move toward NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit. It consists of frames taken by the navigation camera on Spirit during the afternoon of the rover's 501st martian day, or sol (May 31, 2005). The camera was facing into the wind. Contrast has been enhanced for anything in the images that changes from frame to frame, that is, for the dust moved by wind.

Movie (6 Mb)

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Dust storms on Sol 568

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Seen here is a recent Dust Devil storm front

Spirit rover link:

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A dust devil spins across the surface of Gusev Crater just before noon on Mars. NASA's Spirit rover took the series of images in this spectacular 21-frame animation with its navigation camera on the rover's Martian day, or sol, 486 (March 15, 2005).

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Image Credit: NASA/JPL

The event occurred during a period of 9 minutes and 35 seconds beginning at 11:48 a.m. local Mars time, recording the dust devil's progress in a north-easterly direction about 1.0 kilometre away from Spirit's perch on the slopes of the "Columbia Hills."
The whirlwind was travelling at about 4.8 metres per second and covered a distance of about 1.6 kilometres.

Contrast has been enhanced for anything in the images that changes from frame to frame, that is, for the dust devil.
The dust devil is about 34 metres in diameter.

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