Saturday, April 12, 2008

New Images of Phobos, Moon of Mars


Julie over at Virtual Voyage, an awesome site with great photography, gave me a heads up about some new images that had been released of the Mars Moon Phobos. I had talked a little about this moonlet here, in my Beaver Moon post. Back then NASA had just released some new images of the Mars moons Phobos and Deimos.



Phobos and Deimos November, 2007

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took 2 images from around 6,000 kms out from the moonlet and combined them together for a stereo view. NASA also released some anaglyph images of the moonlet. If you have red /blue 3d glasses, and I do, you can see the little moon like it's coming out of the screen towards you, scary stuff.




This moonlet may have a lot of ice water, because of this there is a lot of interest in this little moon, so much so that Russia had launched a couple of spacecraft to Phobos. Phobos 1 was lost after a couple of months due to programming errors and Phobos 2 had made it to the moonlet took a picture of a UFO, so some say, and then one of it's computers died. Never say never, Russian and China have joined together to send Phobos Grunt to land on Phobos and Mars and then return with samples of their surfaces, a very ambitious mission indeed. Phobos Grunt is slated to launch next year.

The night after the Moon/ Pleiades conjunction I was back out and got a cool image of the Moon with earthshine in clouds, I'll leave you now with an animated gif of this image.







35 comments:

Swubird said...

Bob:

Great post with fantastic shots. That is one huge crater on Phobos. You sold me, now I have to go to Amazon and buy a pair of 3-D glasses.

Another winner, Bob.

Have a nice day.

Peter said...

Hi! I don't know how this one survived going on the damage. I can actually see that after the impact that whatever hit it has scraped down the sides and flown off. To put it in more earthly terms, it looks like a hit and run to me. Absolutely amazing!

Take Care,
Peter

p said...

wow that looks like a strange gourd! bizarro
love the photo water at the end. its like silver jewelry

Livingsword said...

What an interesting image, rather inhospitable eh? Could use some Nivea… LOL

Can you picture this ad?:

“I used to have bumpy, pocked skin like Admiral Adama but then I found Nivea, now I’m the latest cover model celebrity Phobos Marsia”

Bob you never cease to amaze me, you own 3-d glasses! You know that is the kind of intimate thing your adoring fans want, nay need to know!!!!

Without the 3-d glasses it looks like the good weather gave you a bit of a sun burn…(Should I now do an ad about aloe Vera?)

I think I have now read 2-3 different sci-fi novels about life on Phobos and so far your sunburned back here is the most compelling evidence….

Very industrious of the Russians and Chinese, I wonder if instead of them providing soil samples from Mars and Phobos we could get them to concentrate on cleaning up their pollution…. (Whoops I can’t believe I said that out loud, that being said perhaps Canada can now stop sending aid money to China!!!)

Wild looking gif Bob….

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks swubird, glad the asteroid that hit the little moonlet there didn't destroy it.:stars:

NASA releases a lot of stuff where the glasses would come in handy, go for it,lol \m/

Bob Johnson said...

Hi Peter, it is amazing it wasn't obliterated isn't it, they say the blue markings means it was a fairly recent hit, like to see what happened to the other guy,lol \m/

Bob Johnson said...

Hey Paula, it is a strange looking moon isn't it, because it only has 1/1000 the gravity of Earth it couldn't form a normal looking sphere. :greenalien:

Cool description of my Moon shot, silver jewelry. :yes: :greenalien:

Bob Johnson said...

lol,lol, love it, that BSG show is the best, too bad it's last season is upon us.:-( :(

Again lol the 3D glasses, when the rover sojourner landed on Mars back in '97 they released a lot of pics in blue red 3D, I bought a sheet of blue and a sheet of red cellophane and made my own glasses to view the pics in full 3D,:proud: then we got 4 real pairs of 3D glasses when I bought the DVD of Spy Kids 3-D game over :stars:

lol, well you actually wrote it out loud, :D :-D

I was quite surprised to read that they were attempting a project of this magnitude, nothing like this has been done before, the only surface samples returned so far have been the Apollo Missions, Moon rock. :confused:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for popping over. You always have such fantastic stuff on your blog, very interesting

Bob Johnson said...

Hey Vic, thanks for dropping by, glad you like the site. \m/

virtual nexus said...

Bob, glad that came in useful - very enjoyable post!

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks Julie for giving me the idea! \m/

RW said...

Phobos moon looks like the top of my skull!

Good job Bob, have a great week!!\m/

Bob Johnson said...

Hey Roger thanks, you have a good week too.

Kat Mortensen said...

Looking at your photos makes me feel like the tiny speck that I am in this immense, imponderable universe.
Kat

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks kat, there is so much out there that makes us all feel a little small.

Sherer said...

Cool pictures Bob, For some reason, I can't get enough of the Bob Johnson originals though..... Not that the hubble or whatever else took those are not excellent picture (especially when it comes to galaxies and the like)...

Interesting fact: Phobos and Deimos are the location of the moon base in the popular game "Doom" in which the gates of hell open up.

Bob Johnson said...

Lol Sherer, I know, I've played Doom, I like my stuff better too,lol. I just took a pic of the Purbach Cross, it is way cool, to find out what it is stay tuned, same bat time same bat channel.\m/\m/\m/\m/\m/\m/\m/\m/

kml said...

That is quite an irregular shape - looks more like a rock than a moon! So interesting what they are finding - truly amazing!

Arjun said...

wow, sweettttt pics. Ive always luved space and stuff but never seen such great shots. AWESOME!

Bob Johnson said...

Hey Kathy, it is actually a big rock, they think it is a captured asteroid.

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks arjun, glad you like the shots, thanks for dropping by.

The Fool said...

Wow Bob, amazing moon/earthshine picture and great quality mars moon pictures.

The Fool

Bob Johnson said...

Hey thanks the fool.

Ruth said...

It reminds me of silly putty. Do you remember that? I want to hold and and squish it and smell it.

That moon/earthshine photo is PRETTY! And nice as a GIF.

1st Lady said...

Just fantastic!

Anonymous said...

Truly another excellent post Bob. Very informative, and your use of images really adds to the impact upon a reader. That moon shot is another wonderful image acquisition. I would love to have that ability with the equipment I now have but alas I have to wait.
Take care Bob.
~JD
I want to see something in the MW Society page. You were chosen because it was felt you are an excellent writer. Post anything you want. Please. Don't be shy.

Oswegan said...

These are terrific images Bob, and awesome information. I keep up with you in my reader, and I wish I could visit the site more often, but for some reason your site brings my computer to its knees. Perhaps the graphics. Great post.

p.s. It looks to me like Swubird is already wearing 3D glasses.

Bob Johnson said...

Lol, yes I do remember silly putty, looks just like it, I remember the smell of it as well, glad you like my cloudy Moon as a gif.

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks 1st lady.\m/\m/\m/

Bob Johnson said...

Thanks JD, hope you get your camera soon, Hopefully do something for the MW society soon.

Bob Johnson said...

Lol, good one about the 3D glasses and swubird, I'll have to look into the computer lag, did you have it before my redo?

Anonymous said...

It has such a strange shape. Reminds me of some of the potatoes I have grown!

Bob Johnson said...

Hey Will, lol.

Max-e said...

Hi Bob, I am back in circulation and have been enjoying your posts.
I must confess that I was surprised to learn about these two moons - maybe I have just forgotten. Phobos is quite a rugged little rock.
Very interesting post and good pics.