Examples

This page shows examples of practical uses of this package.

Start of a global dust storm

When was the start of the 2018 global dust storm? Sanchez-Lavega et al (2019) simply mention they first saw it expanding on 2018-05-30.

import datetime
import mars_time

start = mars_time.datetime_to_marstime(datetime.datetime(2018, 5, 30))
print(start.year, f'{start.sol:.0f}', f'{start.solar_longitude:.0f}')

This gives Mars year 34, sol 379, and a solar longitude 184 degrees.

Opportunity length

How long was the Opportunity rover in operation? Wikipedia’s Opportunity page says it landed on 2004-01-25 at 05:05 UTC and entered hibernation on 2018-06-12.

import datetime
import mars_time

start = mars_time.datetime_to_marstime(datetime.datetime(2004, 1, 25, 5, 5, 0))
end = mars_time.datetime_to_marstime(datetime.datetime(2018, 6, 12, 0, 0, 0))
print(f'{(end-start).sols:.1f}')

This gives 5111.3, consistent with the Wikipedia page.

Season of the water-ice halo

At what solar longitude did Lemmon et al (2022) find water-ice halos? They mention “A water-ice halo was unambiguously visible on sol 292 (of Perseverance’s life)…” and Wikipedia’s Perseverance page mentions the Perseverance rover successfully landed on 2021-02-18 at 20:55 UTC.

import datetime
import mars_time

landing_time = mars_time.datetime_to_marstime(datetime.datetime(2021, 2, 18, 20, 55, 0))
detection_time = landing_time + mars_time.MarsTimeDelta(sol=292)
print(f'{detection_time.solar_longitude:.1f}')

This gives 142.5, consistent with the values in the paper.