PIA01123: Mars Pathfinder Landing Ellipses

Target Name: Mars Is a satellite of: Sol (our sun) Mission: Mars Pathfinder (MPF) Spacecraft: Mars Pathfinder Lander Instrument: Imager for Mars Pathfinder Product Size: 1784 samples x 1271 lines Produced By: JPL Producer ID: P49457 MRPS86247 Addition Date: 1997-12-12 Other Information: Science Magazine, 5 December, 1997 Primary Data Set: MARS_PATHFINDER_PAGE Full-Res TIFF: PIA01123.tif (4.665 MB) Full-Res JPEG: PIA01123.jpg (745.7 kB)

Original Caption Released with Image: Mosaic of Ares Vallis showing different landing ellipses, with color inset of the Chryse Planitia region of Mars showing the outflow channels. The large blue ellipse (100 km by 200 km) to the northwest is an ellipse in the USGS cartographic reference frame designed to avoid streamlined hills to the south and east, craters to the north, and etched terrain to the west (this ellipse is shown in the color inset). The large yellow ellipse (100 km by 200 km) displaced toward the southeast (by 20 km in longitude and 8 km in latitude) is the navigation target ellipse in the revised local cartographic reference frame (which are the latitude and longitude shown in this figure). The elongate light blue ellipse (98 km by 19 km) is the navigation prediction as of late 3 July and early 4 July; it includes part of the streamlined island in the southwest. The gold ellipse (15 km by 8 km) is the prediction with tracking through atmospheric entry. The pink ellipse (41 km by 15 km), which encloses the smallest ellipse (and the location of the lander), is the navigation result with dispersions added for atmospheric entry and descent. The blue X is the location of the lander with respect to surface features identified in Viking orbiter images (located at 19.33 degrees N, 33.55 degrees W in the local reference frame). The location of the lander in inertial space (19.30 degrees N, 33.52 degrees W) from the two-way ranging and Doppler tracking of the lander is at the very northwest edge of the crater, just 2.2 km to the south-southeast of the X. If the location of the lander in inertial space is forced to coincide with its location with respect to surface features, then the resulting cartographic frame is actually 2 km to the south and 0.8 km to the east of the local network. Color mosaic is part of the Oxia Palus Quadrangle (MC 11) of Mars; black and white mosaic from Viking orbiter images of 38 m/pixel resolution; north is at the top. NOTE: original caption as published in Science Magazine Image Credit: NASA/JPL