Mars Odyssey:
NASA has recently captured an epic view of the largest volcano in our solar system named Olympus Mons using the Mars Odyssey orbiter.
- Mars Odyssey was an early mission in NASA’s Mars Exploration Program.
- It was launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on April 7, 2001.
- The Odyssey spacecraft has been orbiting Mars since 2001.
- Odyssey’s original goals were to search for signs of water, make detailed maps of the planet’s surface materials and determine radiation levels for humans.
- The spacecraft holds the record for the longest continually active mission in orbit around a planet other than Earth. Its mission is scheduled to last until 2025.
- It created the first global map of chemical elements and minerals that make up the Martian surface.
- Odyssey continues to study Mars’s surface to see how the planet changes over time.
- The spacecraft also serves as a communications relay to Earth for spacecraft on the surface that lack high-powered antennas and cannot beam information to Earth very quickly.
- Olympus Mons is a shield volcanolocated in Mars’ western hemisphere.
- It is the highest point on Mars and the largest known volcano in the solar system
