A Martian dust devil roughly 12 miles (20 kilometers) high was
captured winding its way along the Amazonis Planitia region of
Northern Mars on March 14, 2012 by the High Resolution Imaging
Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance
Orbiter. Despite its height, the plume is little more than
three-quarters of a football field wide (70 yards, or 70
meters). HiRISE is operated by the University of Arizona,
Tucson. The instrument was built by Ball Aerospace &
Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo. The Mars Reconnaissance
Orbiter Project and the Mars Exploration Rover Project are
managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., for
NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. JPL is a
division of the California Institute of Technology, also in
Pasadena. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, built the
orbiter. For more about the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, see:
http://www.nasa.gov/mro . Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ.
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