page_title: Mount Sharp
section_title: Gallery
hierarchical_section_title: Mount Sharp / Gallery
caption_attribution_description: English: PIA19662: Unfavorable Terrain for Crossing Near 'Logan Pass' http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA19662 UPLOADER NOTE: Original image (7984x2383/11,643 KB) was cropped (7602x2010/2,541 KB) - via JASC Paint Shop Pro v 6.02. This view southeastward from Curiosity's Mast Camera (Mastcam) shows terrain judged difficult for traversing between the rover and an outcrop in the middle distance where a pale rock unit meets a darker rock unit above it. The Mastcam's left-eye camera captured the component images on May 10, 2015, during the 981st Martian day, or sol, of Curiosity's work on Mars. This observation helped the rover team evaluate routes for driving to that geological contact area where the two rock units meet. The outcrop exposing the contact is in the eastern portion of the "Logan Pass" area. The windblown ripples and the steep ground where ripples are lacking are both poor terrain for the rover to cross. The team subsequently chose to approach a different site where the pale and darker rock units are in contact with each other. That alternative site is in the northern portion of the Logan Pass area, outside of this scene. This panorama spans from east, at left, to south-southwest. The color has been approximately white-balanced to resemble how the scene would appear under daytime lighting conditions on Earth. Figure 1 is version of this panorama annotated with two scale bars. The five-meter scale bar nearest the center is just below the geological contact. Five meters is about 16.4 feet. Scale bars of 10 meters (32.8 feet) and 50 centimeters (20 inches) are at mid-distance on the left and in the foreground on the right. Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, built and operates the rover's Mastcam. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, manages the Mars Science Laboratory Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. JPL designed and built the project's Curiosity rover. For more information about Curiosity, visit http://www.nasa.gov/msl and http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl.
context_page_description: Mount Sharp, officially Aeolis Mons, is a mountain on Mars. It forms the central peak within Gale crater and is located around 5.08°S 137.85°E, rising 5.5 km high from the valley floor. Its ID in the United States Geological Survey's Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature is 15000.
  On August 6, 2012, Curiosity landed in "Yellowknife" Quad 51 of Aeolis Palus, next to the mountain. NASA named the landing site Bradbury Landing on August 22, 2012. Aeolis Mons is a primary goal for scientific study. On June 5, 2013, NASA announced that Curiosity would begin an 8 km journey from the Glenelg area to the base of Aeolis Mons. On November 13, 2013, NASA announced that an entryway the rover would traverse on its way to Aeolis Mons was to be named "Murray Buttes", in honor of planetary scientist Bruce C. Murray. The trip was expected to take about a year and would include stops along the way to study the local terrain.
  On September 11, 2014, NASA announced that Curiosity had reached Aeolis Mons, the rover mission's long-term prime destination.
  On October 5, 2015, possible recurrent slope lineae, wet brine flows, were reported on Mount Sharp near Curiosity.
caption: Curiosity's view near "Logan Pass" on the slopes of "Mount Sharp" (May 10, 2015; white balanced image).
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