Utopia Planitia
Utopia Planitia is a vast northern plain, the landing site of Viking 2 in 1976 and later China's Zhurong rover. Explore it in 3D at real scale.
- Location
- 47.6° N, 134.3° E (Viking 2 site)
- Size
- a basin roughly 3,300 km across
- Landed
- Viking 2 in 1976; China's Zhurong rover in 2021, farther south
- Notable
- frost seen on the ground in winter
Utopia Planitia fills one of the largest known impact basins in the Solar System, a depression roughly 3,300 km across in the northern lowlands of Mars. Radar from orbit has found large amounts of buried water ice in parts of the region.
Viking 2 landed there on 3 September 1976 and worked until 1980. Its pictures famously showed a thin layer of frost on the ground during the Martian winter. In 2021 China's Zhurong rover landed in the southern part of Utopia Planitia, far from the Viking 2 site.
What to look for
- Boulder-strewn plains. Viking 2's landing site is rockier than Viking 1's, with many pitted boulders.
- Polygonal ground. Patterns in the soil that form when ground ice freezes and thaws over long periods.
Driving Utopia Planitia in Trawers
This is one of the most northern landing sites in the game. Turn on the weather layer to see how much colder it gets this far from the equator.