Planet Mars: Dust Devil Dance | NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

Planet Mars: Dust Devil Dance | NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

Dune fields in the high southern latitudes of Mars tell a mostly similar story during local summer. The dark dunes grow warmer than the surrounding bright plains because they absorb more sunlight.

Dust devils form over the warm dunes but then dance out over the plains, spinning and performing pirouettes and leaving conspicuous dark tracks as bright dust is lifted from the surface. Loops in the tracks can often be used to discern the direction traveled by the dust devils, where in certain cases, one track clearly overprints the other.

This HiRISE image was captured when NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) was at an altitude of 249 kilometers (155 miles).

The MRO is a spacecraft designed to study the geology and climate of Mars, to provide reconnaissance of future landing sites, and to relay data from surface missions back to Earth. It was launched on August 12, 2005, and reached Mars on March 10, 2006. 

The University of Arizona, in Tucson, operates the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE). It was built by BAE Systems in Boulder, Colorado. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD), Washington.

For more information on MRO, visit:

science.nasa.gov/mission/mars-reconnaissance-orbiter

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
Image Date: Sept. 3, 2020
Release Date: July 13, 2025

#NASA #Space #Astronomy #Science #Mars #Planet #RedPlanet #Atmosphere #Meteorology #Weather #Geology #Geoscience #Landscape #Terrain #DustDevils #Wind #Dust #MRO #MarsOrbiter #MarsSpacecraft #HiRISECamera #JPL #Caltech #UA #UnitedStates #STEM #Education