Explanation:
What's that passing in front of the Sun?
It looks like a moon, but it can't be
Earth's Moon, because it isn't round.
It's the Martian moon
Phobos.
The featured video was taken from the
surface of Mars late last month by the Curiosity rover.
Phobos, at 11.5 kilometers across,
is 150 times smaller than
Luna (our moon) in diameter,
but also 50 times closer to its
parent planet.
In fact,
Phobos is
so close to Mars that
it is expected to break up and crash into
Mars within the next 50 million years.
In the near term, the low orbit of
Phobos
results in more rapid solar eclipses than seen from
Earth.
The
featured video has been sped up -- the actual transit took about 35 seconds.
A similar video was taken of Mars' smaller and most distant moon
Diemos transiting the Sun.
The videographer -- the
robotic rover Curiosity
-- continues to explore
Gale crater,
most
recently
an area with stunning vistas and
unusual rocks dubbed
Glen Torridon.
