{"id":471,"date":"2018-07-09T10:55:49","date_gmt":"2018-07-09T10:55:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/?p=471"},"modified":"2025-02-26T13:28:35","modified_gmt":"2025-02-26T13:28:35","slug":"global-dust-storm-on-mars-july-9th-2018-sol-2105","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/2018\/07\/09\/global-dust-storm-on-mars-july-9th-2018-sol-2105\/","title":{"rendered":"Global Dust Storm on Mars July 9th 2018, Sol 2105"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We are experiencing the most intense global dust storm on Mars since 2001. The Opportunity Rover in Arabia Terra has paused operations as there is not enough sunlight reaching its solar panels to recharge the batteries.\u00a0 On Curiosity, the plutonium radioisotope power source means that we can keep working. However, our views of Mt. Sharp are obscured by dust. On the HiRISE and CaSSIS orbiting cameras, which we are using to select and characterise future landing sites, we may not be able to take useful images until for a few months.<\/p>\n<p>Currently it is between Mars\u2019 southern hemisphere spring equinox and summer solstice. That means more solar radiation is reaching the southern polar ice cap, which is composed of a thin layer of CO2 overlying H2O.\u00a0 As the ice sublimes, the atmospheric thickness increases slightly and so can hold more dust.\u00a0 However, dust storms are unpredictable so we arent sure when the dust will clear.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The image shows a Hubble Space telescope image before and after the global dust storm of 2001.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_472\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-472\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-472\" src=\"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/files\/2018\/07\/Dust-Storm-Mars-2001-PIA03173-300x178.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"178\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/files\/2018\/07\/Dust-Storm-Mars-2001-PIA03173-300x178.jpg 300w, https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/files\/2018\/07\/Dust-Storm-Mars-2001-PIA03173-768x456.jpg 768w, https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/files\/2018\/07\/Dust-Storm-Mars-2001-PIA03173-1024x608.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-472\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Hubble Space telescope image of 2001 global dust storm, similar to the conditions Mars is experiencing at the moment.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We are experiencing the most intense global dust storm on Mars since 2001. The Opportunity Rover in Arabia Terra has paused operations as there is not enough sunlight reaching its solar panels to recharge the batteries.\u00a0 On Curiosity, the plutonium radioisotope power source means that we can keep working. However, our views of Mt. Sharp [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":273,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/273"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=471"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":473,"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471\/revisions\/473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffblogs.le.ac.uk\/mars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}