Hubble Space Telescope Reveals Substantial Changes in Mars’ Surface

Taking advantage of Mars’ closest approach to Earth in eight years, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has taken remarkable new pictures of the red planet. The above image is centered near the Pathfinder landing site. Dark sand dunes that surround the polar ice cap merge into a large, dark region called Acidalia. Below and to the left of Acidalia are the massive canyon systems of Valles Marineris.

The Hubble images, taken near the beginning of May when Mars was 54 million miles from Earth, portray the middle of the Martian northern summer, when the polar cap--composed of water ice like Earth’s--has shrunk to its smallest size. They show that substantial changes in the bright and dark markings of the planet have occurred in the 20 years since the Viking missions first mapped the planet.

Further images and information are available at https://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/pr/1999/27.

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Compiled from Times staff and wire reports.