Mars might be known as the red planet due to all of the iron oxide in its soil, but its skies are a decidedly different story. A new image was recently captured by NASA's Odyssey orbiter and it reveals how the Martian skies are at least sometimes glowing green.
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00:00Mars might be known as the red planet due to all the iron oxide in its soil, but its skies are a decidedly different story.
00:10This image was recently captured by NASA's Odyssey Orbiter, and as you can see, Martian skies are at least sometimes glowing green.
00:17The image was captured around 250 miles over the surface of the planet, and NASA says it took months of planning to get it just right.
00:24That's because this photo was taken at a very similar elevation to the International Space Station,
00:29which is currently in orbit over planet Earth, giving us a view of what that same thing might be like if it were orbiting Mars instead,
00:36with astronomer Jonah Hill saying that no Mars spacecraft has ever had this kind of view before.
00:41The image was actually captured by Odyssey's Martian terrain mapping camera called the Themis, or Thermal Emission Imaging System,
00:47meaning NASA had to reposition the orbiter to point 90 degrees across the Martian surface instead of directly down at it,
00:53and it had to remain in that position long enough to take 10 photos, which were then composited to create this one.
00:58Pretty cool.
00:59Meanwhile, it also caught a glimpse of Mars moon Phobos while it was repositioning,
01:03giving us a rare view of the oblong orbiter.