NASA-International Space Station

NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander, its backshell and its heatshield are observable within this enhanced-color image of the Phoenix landing site taken on Jan. 6, 2010 by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

With early spring at the Phoenix landing site comes progressive sublimation of carbon-dioxide frost that has blanketed the lander and neighboring terrain throughout the winter. During the long polar-winter night, atmospheric carbon dioxide freezes onto the surface, building up a layer of ice roughly 30 centimeters (about one foot) thick. In the spring this frost returns to atmosphere gas (sublimates) over the course of numerous months. This image, part of a seasonal frost monitoring series, shows some areas of bare ground are beginning to be exposed. However, widespread frost patches remain in the topographic lows, such as the troughs of the local polygonally patterned surface.

In HiRISE images acquired during the last Martian summer, the solar arrays on the lander were obviously discernable from their distinctive bluish color. For example, see the sub image at http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/PSP_008855_2485 from June 16, 2008.

The springtime picture here has green boxes around the backshell (top), heat shield, and lander (bottom). The solar arrays are not discernable in this new image, probably because the patchy frost efficiently camouflages them. Even when the frost has entirely sublimated, dust deposited during the winter may obscure them. The parachute attached to the backshell is also not obvious in this image, and we'll see if it reappears in later images. Also gone are the dark halos around the lander, backshell, and heat shield, again due to cyclic frost, dust or both. This and future images will help standardize expectations for finding the Mars Polar Lander hardware, which encountered Mars in 1999.

This picture covers a swath of ground about 300 meters (about 1,000 feet) wide, at 68.2 degrees north latitude, 234.3 degrees east longitude. It is one creation from HiRISE observation ESP_016160_2485. Other image products from this observation are available at http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/phoenix-spring.php .

The University of Arizona, Tucson, operates the HiRISE camera, which was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, is the prime contractor for the project and built the spacecraft.