There has been other footage of eclipses from Mars, but we call this the coolest ever because it was filmed with Perseverance’s zoomable Mastcam-Z. And we’re putting any eclipse movie from Mars above any from Earth because, well, it’s from Mars. And NASA calls it “the most detailed yet.” Here’s the NASA video (TurboFuture link here), posted on Reddit: NASA says there is more to filming the eclipse than just capturing eye-popping video. “Our eclipse observations don’t just look cool: they’re helping us measure the dwindling orbit of Phobos, which is destined to crash into Mars some tens of millions of years from now.” The video, filmed April 2, is in real-time, NASA says. It lasted a little more than 40 seconds—much shorter than a typical solar eclipse on Earth. Why is the moon jagged, not round? “Phobos is on the smaller side for a moon—only about 15 miles in diameter,” NASA explains to commenter pjvincentaz . “So its gravity isn’t strong enough to shape it into a sphere.” And how often can eclipses be seen from the red planet? “Any given spot on Mars is likely to see at least a couple every spring and fall equinox,” according to NASA. “Don’t forget that a year on Mars is about 687 days, nearly twice as long as on Earth.” Phobos is one of Mars’ two moons. The other is Deimos. Commenter iii2H0T4Uiii was blown away by the size of the moon relative to the sun: “I was expecting to see a tiny dot almost had a jump scare lol.” “I’m so thankful I live in a time that I can experience these kinds of phenomena,” added pjvincentaz. Agreed. So are we, and we’ll post more footage from Perseverance is it becomes available. Watch this, er, space.
