Solar eclipses on Mars around Mars, the shadow of Phobos was seen in pictures transmitted to Earth. One of these photos was from the NASA rover "Opportunity". Solar eclipses on Mars The two moons of Mars, Phobos and Deimos, are much smaller than the Moon, greatly reducing the frequency of solar eclipses on that planet. Neither moon's apparent diameter is large enough to cover the disk of the sun, and therefore they are annular solar eclipses and can also be considered transits. Due to the small size of Phobos (about ) and its rapid orbital motion, an observer on the surface of Mars would
Moons of Mars remounted and put in a new dome, where it remains into the 21st century. The names, originally spelled "Phobus" and "Deimus", respectively, were suggested by Henry Madan (1838–1901), Science Master of Eton, from Book XV of the Iliad, where Ares summons Fear and Fright. In 1959, Walter Scott Houston perpetrated a celebrated April Fool's hoax in the April edition of the "Great Plains Observer", claiming that "Dr. Arthur Hayall of the University of the Sierras reports that the moons of Mars are actually artificial satellites". Both Dr. Hayall and the University of the Sierras were fictitious. The hoax gained worldwide