Dust devils are whirlwinds of dust that are blown across Mars’s surface. They are one way that dust gets lifted into the Red Planet’s thin atmosphere and transported from one place to another.
The High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA’s Mars Express tracked this dust devil across the martian surface on 20 November 2018. The dust devil was one of 1039 found as part of new research published today in Science Advances, which used 20 years of images from European Mars orbiters to use dust devils to trace strong surface winds on the Red Planet.
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[Image description: A greyscale satellite image showing the surface of Mars with a bright, swirling dust devil – a tornado-like column of dust – moving across a flat, dusty plain. The dust devil appears as a light, vertical streak, casting a faint shadow. Nearby, there are a few small craters and subtle surface textures, highlighting the rugged Martian landscape.]