{ "title": "A Candidate Landing Site in Utopia Planitia", "authors": "HiRISE", "metadata": { "thumbnailURL": "bundle://header.jpg", "excerpt": "The flatter, the better! When looking for a landing site, you don’t want the terrain to be too rocky, so the fairly smooth plains of Utopia Planitia might be a good bet." }, "version": "1.5", "identifier": "ESP_062898_2060", "language": "en", "layout": { "columns": 10, "width": 1024, "margin": 85, "gutter": 20 }, "documentStyle": { "backgroundColor": "#faf7f2" }, "components": [ { "role": "heading1", "layout": "heading1Layout", "text": "HiPOD: THURSDAY, 13 FEBRUARY 2020" }, { "role": "divider", "layout": "bigDividerLayout", "stroke": { "width": 3, "color": "#8c2028" } }, { "role": "title", "layout": "halfMarginBelowLayout", "text": "A Candidate Landing Site in Utopia Planitia" }, { "role": "photo", "layout": "fullBleedLayout", "caption": "An enhanced color cutout showing the fairly smooth terrain. Less than 1 km across. (NASA/JPL/UArizona)", "URL": "bundle://ESP_062898_2060-main-02-13.jpg" }, { "role": "body", "format": "html", "layout": "hipodMarginLayout", "text": "
This image samples the smooth plains within one of the areas being considered for setting down China’s lander and rover, expected to launch in 2020.
While smooth on large scales, HiRISE reveals small-scale roughness elements, including craters, boulders, and other features. Such hazards may be avoided by using “terminal hazard avoidance,” a technology China has demonstrated on the Moon.
Utopia Planitia may have been extensively resurfaced by mud flows, so it is an interesting place to investigate potential past subsurface habitability.
ID: ESP_062898_2060
date: 27 December 2019
altitude: 288 km
NASA/JPL/UArizona