NASA’s Mars Orbiter captures spectacular image of new crater

Impact crater on Mars. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona)

NASA’s Mars Orbiter has captured a beautiful high resolution image of a crater from a fresh asteroid impact.

The photograph, which captured in November 2013, shows the crater in the middle, surrounded by a huge rayed blast zone with streams of black dust emanating from the centre. The crater is about 30m in diameter, with debris from the impact seen up to 14km from epicentre.

The image was taken by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera, known as HiRISE on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.