4
$\begingroup$

I'd like to know the distance between the Curiosity rover on Mars (currently at Mount Sharp, I believe) and the landing site of the Perseverance rover (the Jezero crater). Is there an application or website like google maps that lets you calculate distances? Alternatively, where can I find a good map of the surface of Mars?

So far I only found detail traverse maps and high resolution pictures of the surface, but that's not really what I'm looking for. The picture below is close, but it has no distance scale.

I did a calculation based on the coordinates on Wikipedia (assuming a spherical planet as usual), which gives me 3584.12 km for the chord length and thus 1.1141576453620496...rad for the inner angle spanned by the two coordinates. This leads to a distance of 3776.44 km. I don't know if this is actually the distance between the two rovers...

enter image description here

Improve this question
$\endgroup$
1

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
9
$\begingroup$

As OrganicMarble noted in the comments, Google Earth Pro has a nice map of Mars with all the rovers and landers included. And you can also measure distance. For example, here's the distance between Jezero Crater (left), and where Curiosity is in Gale Crater (right):

enter image description here

As you can see, your estimate was pretty close. Google Earth Pro shows 3717 km, and your estimate was 3776 km.

Improve this answer
$\endgroup$
1
  • $\begingroup$ Nice! I didn't know how to do it. $\endgroup$
    – Organic Marble
    Feb 12, 2021 at 20:26

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge that you have read and understand our privacy policy and code of conduct.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.