Phoenix Opens Its Eyes

This is one of the first images captured by NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander which landed on the red planet yesterday. It touched down in an arctic region called Vastitas Borealis, at 68 degrees north latitude, 234 degrees east longitude.

The flat landscape is strewn with tiny pebbles and shows polygonal cracking, a pattern seen widely in Martian high latitudes and also observed in permafrost terrains on Earth. The polygonal cracking is believed to have resulted from seasonal freezing and thawing of surface ice.

There's another image here. [via]