Chryse Planitia

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Plane on mars
Chryse Planitia
The landing area around the Viking 1 probe in Chryse Planitia.
The landing area around the Viking 1 probe in Chryse Planitia.
Chryse Planitia (Mars)
Chryse Planitia
position 27 °  N , 37 °  W Coordinates: 27 °  N , 37 °  W
surface 500,000 km²
expansion 1600 km
depth 2500 m
history
Eponym Ancient Greek for golden plane

Chryse Planitia is an extensive plain on the planet Mars . Your name is derived from ancient Greek and means something like "golden plane".

description

The center of the area, which has a diameter of 1,600 km and is up to 2.5 km deep, is located at latitude 27 ° north and longitude 37 ° west. The area has an area of ​​about 500,000 km 2 .

Chryse Planitia is a huge depression 2 to 4 km below the topographical zero line of the planet. It was probably caused by the impact of a larger meteorite . The largest outflow valleys of Mars, Kasei Vallis , Ares Vallis , Tiu Vallis and Simud Vallis flow into this depression. About 3 billion years ago, huge volumes of water evidently flowed here. The stones and sands carried along were deposited as sediments in Chryse Planitia.

Since the region is geologically very interesting, two space probes landed here:

  • On July 20, 1976, the Viking 1 probe touched down and sent the first photos of the surface of Mars.
  • The Pathfinder space probe landed on July 4, 1997 at the transition from Ares Vallis to Chryse Planitia . The Mars rover Sojourner carried along investigated the area around the probe until September 1997.

Web links

Commons : Chryse Planitia  - collection of images, videos and audio files