Olympus Mons - one of the largest volcanoes in the Solar System

 

Clouds over Olympus Mons Mars - 127mm Meade Apo Refractor, x3 Barlow and QHY5-11 colour planetary camera. Credit: Kurt Thrust

" As the weather continues to be poor in Lowestoft, I have amused myself by reprocessing some of the video clips captured earlier in the month by our student assistant Reggie Stax. We believe the circle of white clouds in the centre of the image formed over the extinct shield volcano Olympus Mons. Olympus Mons covers an area of 300,000 square kilometres which is roughly the area of Italy. It is 21 kilometres high or approximately 2.5 times the height of Everest" - Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.