Phobos and Deimos transits..

Opportunity manages to catch them both...

Big huh?
http://mysite.freeserve.com/blobrana...stTransits.jpg

A rare solar crossing of the Sun by the martian moon Deimos on the 4
th March was captured by the Panoramic Camera of Opportunity Mars
rover.
The solar transit of the martian moon occurs only twice per Mars year
(one Mars year equals roughly two Earth years).
Deimos is a dark body that appears to be composed of C-type surface
materials, similar to that of asteroids found in the outer asteroid
belt. Named after the Roman God of dread, Deimos is the smaller of
Mars' two moons. Deimos whirls around Mars every 30 hours. The natural
moon is 10 by 7.5 miles (16 by 12 kilometers) in size...

Like its sister moon Phobos ( Greek for "Fear") is non-spherical in
shape. Probably , it too is a captured asteroid. Mission scientists
hope to be able to catch a similar eclipse with the larger and closer
orbiting moon Phobos - which could blot out half the sun or more - for
40-30 seconds . Somewhere near the martian equator, Phobos eclipses
the sun nearly every day.

On 8 Mar 2004 21:45:38 -0800, (blobrana) wrote:

Opportunity manages to catch them both...

Big huh?
http://mysite.freeserve.com/blobrana...stTransits.jpg

A rare solar crossing of the Sun by the martian moon Deimos on the 4
th March was captured by the Panoramic Camera of Opportunity Mars
rover.
The solar transit of the martian moon occurs only twice per Mars year
(one Mars year equals roughly two Earth years).
Deimos is a dark body that appears to be composed of C-type surface
materials, similar to that of asteroids found in the outer asteroid
belt. Named after the Roman God of dread, Deimos is the smaller of
Mars' two moons. Deimos whirls around Mars every 30 hours. The natural
moon is 10 by 7.5 miles (16 by 12 kilometers) in size...

Like its sister moon Phobos ( Greek for "Fear") is non-spherical in
shape. Probably , it too is a captured asteroid. Mission scientists
hope to be able to catch a similar eclipse with the larger and closer
orbiting moon Phobos - which could blot out half the sun or more - for
40-30 seconds . Somewhere near the martian equator, Phobos eclipses
the sun nearly every day.

Impossible. According to the Millennium group, and other bunches of
chicken littles, Phobos was destroyed by a comet in 1999.

--

Find out about Australia's most dangerous Doomsday Cult:
http://users.bigpond.net.au/wanglese/pebble.htm

"You can't fool me, it's turtles all the way down."