Olympus Mons
Olympus Mons (; Latin for 'Mount Olympus') is a large shield volcano on Mars. It is over 21.9 km (13.6 mi; 72,000 ft) high as measured by the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA), about 2.5 times the elevation of Mount Everest above sea level. It is Mars's tallest volcano, its tallest planetary mountain, and is approximately tied with Rheasilvia on Vesta as the tallest mountain currently discovered in the Solar System. It is associated with the volcanic region of Tharsis Montes. It last erupted 25 million years ago.
Olympus Mons is the youngest of the large volcanoes on Mars, having formed during the Martian Hesperian Period with eruptions continuing well into the Amazonian Period. It has been known to astronomers since the late 19th century as the albedo feature Nix Olympica (Latin for "Olympic Snow"), and its mountainous nature was suspected well before space probes confirmed it as a mountain.
Two impact craters on Olympus Mons have been assigned provisional names by the International Astronomical Union: the 15.6-kilometre-diameter (9.7 mi) Karzok crater and the 10.4-kilometre-diameter (6.5 mi) Pangboche crater. They are two of several suspected source areas for shergottites, the most abundant class of Martian meteorites.
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