The wind-carved north edge of Mars’ largest volcanic ash field
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 26, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists label as the “relation between flutes and flows”.
The flood lava plain in the northern part of this picture represents the flows. At some point in the distant past some event, either a volcanic eruption, or a large impact, caused lava to spew out across this terrain, leaving behind a smooth plain that has only partly been marked by later crater impacts.
The many parallel ridges pointing to the northeast in the southern part of the picture represent the flutes.
One other very important flow is not directly visible. The prevailing winds that blow to the southwest are what carved these flutes, slowly pushing the material southward while carving out the many gaps between the ridges.
The white dot near the center of the overview map to the right marks this location, on the very northern edge of the Medusae Fossae Formation, the largest volcanic ash field on Mars. It is believed that most of the planet’s dust comes from this ash field. It is also evident that the ash is a leftover from the time period more than a billion years ago when the giant volcanoes that surround this field were erupting regularly. The eruptions laid down vast flood lava plains that coat the surface for thousands of miles.
The ash either came from the eruptions themselves, or was created as the thin Martian wind eroded those flood lava plains, slowly stripping ash from the top. The ash then gathered within the black-outlined regions on the map.
In this picture we are seeing an even later process, whereby the wind is reshaping that ash field.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
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Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 26, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists label as the “relation between flutes and flows”.
The flood lava plain in the northern part of this picture represents the flows. At some point in the distant past some event, either a volcanic eruption, or a large impact, caused lava to spew out across this terrain, leaving behind a smooth plain that has only partly been marked by later crater impacts.
The many parallel ridges pointing to the northeast in the southern part of the picture represent the flutes.
One other very important flow is not directly visible. The prevailing winds that blow to the southwest are what carved these flutes, slowly pushing the material southward while carving out the many gaps between the ridges.
The white dot near the center of the overview map to the right marks this location, on the very northern edge of the Medusae Fossae Formation, the largest volcanic ash field on Mars. It is believed that most of the planet’s dust comes from this ash field. It is also evident that the ash is a leftover from the time period more than a billion years ago when the giant volcanoes that surround this field were erupting regularly. The eruptions laid down vast flood lava plains that coat the surface for thousands of miles.
The ash either came from the eruptions themselves, or was created as the thin Martian wind eroded those flood lava plains, slowly stripping ash from the top. The ash then gathered within the black-outlined regions on the map.
In this picture we are seeing an even later process, whereby the wind is reshaping that ash field.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
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