Long March 5B core stage from July 24th launch remains in orbit

According to data from the U.S. Space Command, the core stage of the Long March 5B rocket used to launch China’s next large module for its Tiangong space station is still in orbit, with no indication yet that China has the ability to safely de-orbit it over the ocean in a controlled manner.

From Jonathan McDowell’s Twitter feed:

Two objects cataloged from the CZ-5B launch: 53239 / 2022-085A in a 166 x 318 km x 41.4 deg orbit, 53240 / 2022-085B in a 182 x 299 km x 41.4 deg orbit. Orbital epoch of ~1200 UTC confirms that the inert 21t rocket core stage remains in orbit and was not actively deorbited.

In all previous Long March 5B launches the core stage reached orbit, deployed its payload, and then crashed back to Earth uncontrolled a few weeks later because its engines could not be restarted. Since it is large, pieces hit the ground, but fortunately nothing landed in habitable areas. In one case however had the return occurred fifteen minutes earlier it would have landed in the New York City metropolitan area.

There were comments made during the launch countdown by Chinese officials suggesting the stage’s engine can now be restarted to allow it to be de-orbited properly, but if so there is as yet no indication that this has happened. If anything, the presence of these objects in orbit suggest otherwise.

It is also possible Chinese engineers are doing further orbital tests with both objects, and will de-orbit them properly in the next week or so. That China conducted a series of static fire tests of this stage’s engines prior to launch strongly suggested that they can now control its re-entry.

Since China won’t say, however, we can only wait and watch.

OneWeb and Eutelsat negotiating possible merger

In a press release today the geosynchronous (GEO) communications satellite company Eutelsat revealed that it is negotiating a possible merger with the low Earth orbit (LEO) communications satellite company OneWeb.

The combined entity would be the first multi-orbit satellite operator offering integrated GEO and LEO solutions and would be uniquely positioned to address a booming ~$16bn (2030) Satellite Connectivity market. OneWeb is one of the two only global LEO networks and has experienced strong momentum over recent months, with service expected to be fully deployed in 2023.

The transaction would represent a logical next step in the successful partnership between Eutelsat and OneWeb, started with Eutelsat’s equity investment in OneWeb in April 2021 and deepened with the Global Distribution Agreement announced in March 2022. Eutelsat currently holds 23% of OneWeb’s share capital, alongside a consortium of high-profile public and private investors.

Under the terms of the transaction being discussed, Eutelsat and OneWeb shareholders would each hold 50% of the combined group’s shares. [emphasis mine]

This appears to be an attempt by Eutelsat to survive, since the future of geosynchronous communications satellites is presently very questionable with the arrival of the many LEO satellite constellations like OneWeb and Starlink.

Meanwhile, the highlighted words in the quote do not match reality. If anything OneWeb has stalled badly since February, when Russia invaded the Ukraine and cancelled the remaining half dozen or so scheduled OneWeb launches. OneWeb has announced new launch contracts with SpaceX and India, but because none have even been scheduled, it increasingly appears its constellation will not be operational by 2023.

Completely misunderstanding Trump’s influence in the Republican Party

In a column today at PJMedia, Rick Moran discussed in detail the battle going on right now in Arizona for control of the Republican Party. On one side we have Donald Trump and the candidates he has endorsed, led by Kari Lake for governor and Blake Masters for the Senate. On the other we have establishment candidates endorsed by former vice president Mike Pence and Arizona governor Doug Ducey.

Right now, the polls indicated strongly that the Trump side in this battle is going to win the August 2nd primary, and Moran was attempting to pinpoint the fundamental beliefs behind this rift.

The split in the Republican Party in Arizona and almost everywhere else is not a fight over issues. It’s not even a fight over Trump. It’s a fight over the perception of the party and what it means to be a Republican.

Trump defines the party in terms of loyalty to Donald Trump. And Trump defines “loyalty” as the extent to which you support him — personally and politically. Many Republicans see nothing wrong with that. Others, like Pence, see that kind of cult of personality as unconservative and dangerous. They take a far more traditional view of the Republican Party and want a return to the GOP’s roots of supporting God, low taxes, and small government.

In other words, according to Moran, ordinary Republicans are voting for Trump due to hero-worship, while establishment Republicans oppose Trump because they think such hero-worship unhealthy.

Moran’s analysis appears to represent the thinking of many Republican pundits. It also represents an analysis that is so wrong and out of touch with ordinary Republicans as to be downright laughable.

People are not voting for Trump-endorsed candidates because a childish “loyalty” to Trump. They are voting for his candidates because — based on his actions as President — they strongly believe those candidates are actually going to keep their conservative promises should they win. Trump did keep his campaign promises, and it appears he is trying to find candidates who will do the same. He knows that Republicans are sick and tired of fake conservatives like Pence and Ducey and the Bushes, who for decades have repeatedly made big conservative promises during the campaign but then have stabbed those voters in the back the minute any Democrat screamed at them.

These fakers simply don’t fight, and in Arizona, it is very clear that the candidates whom Pence and Ducey have endorsed are just another bunch of fakers. As soon as they get into office, they will forget all their conservative promises, and team up with the Democrats to maintain the failing status quo.

This is why there is a rift in the Republican Party. The established party has been a failure, and the new upstarts being touted by Trump appear willing to change that. Republican voters have come to recognize that — thanks to Trump — and are now voting accordingly, which is why an enormous number of Republican incumbents have been defeated this primary season.

It is astonishing to find that conservative pundits still don’t recognize these facts. Not only will their blindness leave them repeatedly shocked when Trump candidates win, it makes it impossible for them to understand the true dynamics behind this election season.

Curiosity looks back

Curiosity looks back
Click for full image.

Overview
Click for interactive map.

Cool image time! Normally I’d be hiking today, but since it is raining in southern Arizona at every mountain location we might want to go, I am forced to imagine hiking on Mars instead. The photo above, cropped to post here, was part of a mosaic of images taken on July 22, 2022 by the right navigation camera on the rover Curiosity.

Curiosity had just completed several drives that had it skirt around those two boulders visible in the center of the picture, as shown in the inset in the overview map to the right. The yellow lines indicate the approximate area covered by the photo. The blue dot marks Curiosity’s present location. The larger red dotted line the rover’s original planned route, with the smaller dotted line my guess as to the route the science team now plans to take to return to that course.

The rim of Gale Crater can be seen in the far distance, about 20 to 30 miles away and largely obscured by the winter dust that presently fills the atmosphere.

The science team had hoped to get close enough to these two boulders to touch them with the rover’s instruments, but decided to keep away because of both appeared a bit unstable.

SpaceX launches another 53 Starlink satellites

Capitalism in space: SpaceX today successfully used its Falcon 9 rocket to launch another 53 Starlink satellites into orbit.

This was the eighth flight of the first stage, which successfully landed on a drone ship in the Atlantic. This was also the company’s sixth launch in July, in only three weeks.

The leaders in the 2022 launch race:

33 SpaceX
24 China
9 Russia
5 Rocket Lab
4 ULA

American private enterprise now leads China 46 to 24 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 46 to 40.

China successfully launches new large module to its Tiangong space station

Tiangong-3, completed
Tiangong-3 station, when completed

The new colonial movement: China on July 24, 2022 (China time) has successfully used its Long March 5B rocket to put into orbit its Wentian module, the next large section that will dock with the Tiangong station in the next day or so.

According to one announcer, the core stage will not crash to Earth in an uncontrolled manner, as in previous Long March 5B launches. However, this is China, and his statement cannot be taken at face value. We shall find out in the coming days if this is so, or whether the core stage will be a threat to habitable areas as its orbit decays.

The leaders in the 2022 launch race:

32 SpaceX
24 China
9 Russia
5 Rocket Lab
4 ULA

The U.S. still leads China 45 to 24 in the national rankings, as well as the entire globe combined 45 to 40.

Watch China’s launch of next big module to its Tiangong space station

The launch of the next big module to China’s Tiangong space station, dubbed Wentian, is scheduled for 2:15 am (eastern) tonight, using its Long March 5B rocket.

The live stream is embedded below if you want to watch. It begins at about an hour before launch.

I have added a live stream in English, below the first. One detail of importance that this broadcast has already revealed: According to one technical expert being interviewed, the core stage will not crash to Earth uncontrolled. They will be able to bring it down where and when they want.
» Read more

China releases one photo of Phobos taken by its Tianwen-1 Mars orbiter

Phobos as seen by Tianwen-1
Click to see original photo.

China today released a single photo of the Martian moon Phobos, taken by its Tianwen-1 Mars orbiter, to mark the second anniversary of the orbiter’s launch.

The English press release at the link conveniently did not provide the image to the non=Chinese world, but the Chinese language release did. That picture is to the right, reduced slightly to post here. Considering its disinterest in making it easy to find this photo for English speakers, it is intriguing that China included the English language name Opik for one crater.

Moreover, this single picture release illustrates the paucity of Tianwen-1 photos made available to the public by China. Very few have been released, and though eventually China has been making its raw data available, it has not been doing so in a manner that makes it easy for outsiders to access it.

Nonetheless, this is one of the best pictures of Phobos I have yet seen.

NASA’s safety panel questions NASA commitment to commercial space stations

We’re here to help you! Not surprisingly, members of NASA’s safety panel have once again expressed doubts about NASA’s ongoing effort to encourage a thriving private, competitive, and efficient commercial space industry, this time questioning the transition from NASA’s government-built space station, ISS, to privately-built and owned space stations, four of which are presently under development.

At a July 21 meeting of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, members said they were concerned that commercial stations whose development is being supported by NASA were unlikely to be ready in time before the ISS is retired at the end of the decade, and that those efforts suffered from insufficient budgets.

Those plans, called Commercial Leo Earth Orbit (LEO) Destinations by NASA, “are on a precarious trajectory to realization on a schedule and within the projected resources needed to maintain a NASA LEO presence,” said Patricia Sanders, chair of the panel. “This is an area of concern for us.”

The panelists also questioned how quickly the stations would be man-rated (claiming NASA was not allocating enough time to do so) as well as whether NASA had enough work for four stations.

For the past decade this safety panel has consistently shown itself to be hostile to the new commercial space companies. It has never seen any safety issues or scheduling problems with NASA’s big SLS rocket. Nor did it notice Boeing’s significant software and valve problems on Starliner. Yet somehow, the work of SpaceX was dangerous (when it was not), and now these new stations, most of which are being built by new space companies, are equally unfit for use.

It is time to shut down this panel. Or at a minimum fire its present members and bring in new blood more willing to look at the entire space industry with a more objective eye.

A large majority of today’s college students think blacklisting is a good thing

The user manual for the modern generation
The user manual for the modern generation

The modern dark age: Old-fashioned Americans, who believe in free speech and tolerance, often assume that the spate of cruel blacklisting stories that now dominate our society are merely the actions of a few isolated individuals who have happened to gain a position of power and are abusing it.

This assumption could not be more wrong. We are entering a future where blacklisting, censorship, and the abuse of power will become the norm, because apparently the new generation thinks such things are always justified, if they have been offended in any way. From a recent poll of 2,000 students at 130 colleges:

In one eye-opening finding, 74 percent of undergrads endorse the view that a professor who says “something that students find offensive” should be reported to the university. By a majority almost as lopsided, 65 percent believe that a fellow student who says something they consider offensive should be turned in. That informers’ mindset is especially pronounced among students who identify themselves as politically liberal, fully 85 percent of whom would report a professor who offends them. But even among self-identified conservatives, a solid majority, 56 percent, are of the same mindset. [emphasis in original]

» Read more

SpaceX successfully launches another 46 Starlink satellites

Capitalism in space: SpaceX today successfully used its Falcon 9 rocket to place another 46 Starlink satellites into orbit.

The first stage, completing its fourth flight, landed successfully on a drone ship in the Pacific.

This was SpaceX’s 32nd launch in 2022, exceeding the record of 31 launches it set last year, and doing so only a little more than halfway through the year.

The leaders in the 2022 launch race:

32 SpaceX
23 China
9 Russia
5 Rocket Lab
4 ULA

American private enterprise now leads China 45 to 23 in the national rankings, and the entire globe combined 45 to 39.

Collapsed dunes in Jezero Crater

Collapsed dune on Mars
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo above, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on July 20, 2022 by one of high resolution cameras on the rover Perseverance. It shows what appears to be a collapsed dune on the floor of Jezero Crater.

The arrows mark the highest dune ridge line that suddenly ends at a cliff, with the sand that is piled up at its base appearing almost like it flowed like thick mud outward away from that cliff. Apparently, that material broke off in one single event sometime in the past.

Note the many parallel lines pointing outward from the base of the cliff. These lines appear to reflect the internal structure visible in the cliff itself. Somehow, when that sand collapsed, it flowed away while retaining some of that structure.

When this collapse happened is unclear. I don’t think it has happened recently, since Perseverance’s arrival, but I could be wrong.

China rethinking its proposed heavy lift rocket to make it a Starship clone

Long March 9, now a Starship clone

Chinese rocket designers appear to be rethinking the proposed design of the Long March 9 heavy lift rocket that China is building, switching from an expendable clone of NASA’s SLS to a reusable clone of SpaceX’s Starship/Superheavy.

The original design had called for three expendable stages and four strap-on expendable boosters using kerosene fuel, and was targeting a 2030 launch. The new design is two reusable stages, with the first having 26 engines fueled by methane, and would launch by 2035.

The image to the right is a screen capture from a presentation given by a long time rocket designer in China, viewable here cued to this point. Note the two large rockets on the right. The smaller is a two stage version, while the larger is a three stage version. Both look remarkably like Starship/Superheavy.

Isar Aerospace signs deal to launch from French Guiana

Capitalism in space: The German smallsat rocket startup Isar Aerospace has now signed a deal with the French space agency CNES to use one of its launchpads in French Guiana for launches of its new Spectrum rocket.

The Diamant pad was built more than a half-century ago for the French rocket of the same name, but has been dormant for decades. CNES is now working to convert the facility into a multi-user site for small launch vehicles, and Isar is the first company the agency selected in an open competition to use the site.

Isar also has a deal to launch from Norway. As recently as seven months ago the company was claiming its first test launch would occur there before the end of ’22. All told, Isar has three different launch contracts and has raised almost $200 million in investment capital.

Draper wins NASA contract to put a lander on the Moon’s far side

Capitalism in space: NASA yesterday awarded a $73 million contract to the space company Draper to place a lander on the Moon’s far side by 2025.

The lander, called SERIES-2 by Draper, will deliver to Schrödinger Basin three experiments to collect seismic data, measure the heat flow and electrical conductivity of the lunar subsurface and measure electromagnetic phenomena created by the interaction of the solar wind and plasma with the lunar surface.

The mission is the eighth NASA has awarded to date as part of CLPS, but the first to go to the lunar farside. The only mission by any country to land on the far side of the moon is China’s Chang’e-4 mission, which successfully landed in Von Kármán Crater in January 2019 and deployed the Yutu 2 rover that remains operational today.

With this award, there are presently five American companies with contracts to put landers on the Moon, Intuitive Machines, Astrobotic, Firefly, and Masten. Masten however shut down operations recently. This new contract to Draper for almost the exact same amount that had been awarded to Masten appears to replace Masten in the program.

Using the Wuhan panic to kill children

Excess mortality by age
The shocking rise of excess mortality since young people
began getting the jab

The evidence continues to pour in: Not only were the authoritarian polices imposed by governments worldwide following the arrival of COVID in 2020 a total failure — doing nothing to prevent the spread of the virus — it now appears the edicts forcing millions to get the COVID jab and wear masks might very well have caused serious harm, even death, to many individuals for whom the virus posed no threat at all.

And it more and more appears that the worst victims of these failed policies were children.

The following stories, all published since my last Wuhan panic update on June 30th, point specifically to the failure of the jab:

These new research confirms many previous studies. For example, in 2021 the American Heart Association issued its own warning about mRNA vaccines, stating that this drug could “dramatically increase risk of developing heart disease.” Other earlier research can be found at my own reports on February 14th, March 23rd, March 30th, May 11th, May 13th, and June 30th. The data increasingly demonstrates that the COVID shots not only accomplished practically nothing in stopping the virus, those shots had side effects that have unnecessarily harmed possibly millions.

Similarly, studies continue to confirm what a hundred years of past research had found, that masks are essentially useless in stopping the spread of a virus such as COVID, and can actually increase your chances of getting this or other diseases.
» Read more

SpaceX launch aborted 46 seconds before launch

Capitalism in space: In what has become a rare event for SpaceX, the company was forced to abort a launch of a Falcon 9 rocket today carrying 46 Starlink satellites only 46 seconds before launch.

The company has scrubbed a few launches in the past three years due to weather, but I think this is the first launch abort apparently due to a technical issue in several years.

No details were given for the abort, but whatever the issue was, it was apparently not serious, as the launch team immediately announced that they have recycled the launch to its back-up date tomorrow.

Perseverance spots a string on Mars!

A piece of string on Mars
Click for full image.

According to the Perseverance science team, they believe the strange spaghetti-like object to the right, taken by one of the rover’s hazard avoidance camera’s on July 12, 2022, is actually a piece of string that fell here during the rover’s landing in February 2021.

The string could be from the rover or its descent stage, a component similar to a rocket-powered jet pack used to safely lower the rover to the planet’s surface, according to a spokesperson for the Perseverance mission at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Perseverance had not previously been in the area where the string was found, so it’s likely the wind blew it there, the spokesperson said.

The string, which appears to be a few inches across, was apparently gone four days later, when another hazard avoidance picture was taken of the same spot

An official description from the scientists is expected in a week or so.

The earliest galaxy so far seen?

Earliest galaxy?

Scientists using the James Webb Space Telescope now think they have identified a galaxy formed only 330 million years after the Big Bang.

The red smudge in the centre of this image [to the right] is thought to be a galaxy with a redshift of around z=13, as seen by the NIRCam instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope. This redshift estimate is based on photometry so the object remains a candidate rather than a confirmed high-redshift galaxy, but if confirmed spectroscopically this would be the highest-redshift galaxy yet observed.

You can read the research paper itself here [pdf]. The galaxy is actually very young, and its nature, along with a second also described by the research, appears to contradict expectations. From the paper’s abstract:

These sources, if confirmed, join GNz11 in defying number density forecasts for luminous galaxies based on Schechter UV luminosity functions, which require a survey area > 10× larger than we have
studied here to find such luminous sources at such high redshifts. They extend evidence from lower redshifts for little or no evolution in the bright end of the UV luminosity function into the cosmic dawn epoch, with implications for just how early these galaxies began forming. This, in turn, suggests that future deep JWST observations may identify relatively bright galaxies to much earlier epochs than might have been anticipated. [emphasis mine]

In other words, this early data from Webb suggests that galaxies formed much faster than expected after the Big Bang. This either means all the theories describing the Bang are wrong, or that it might not have even happened.

Northrop Grumman delays next Cygnus cargo mission

Northrop Grumman officials have now revealed that it has been forced to delay the next Cygnus cargo mission to ISS from August to October because of “supply chain issues.”

What these supply chain issues were the company did not specify. However, the Antares rocket that launches Cygnus uses Russian engines attached a Ukrainian first stage. Northrop Grumman presently only has enough engines and stages for two more flights. While there are indications that the Ukrainian war has not yet prevented the delivery of future Ukrainian first stages, the Russians have blocked all further engine sales.

A new American rocket engine company, Ursa Major, is building a new engine capable of replacing the Russian engines, but the engine won’t be ready until ’25.

The delay could be Northrop Grumman’s effort to stretch out the schedule of its last two Antares launches in the hope that the Russians will lift their embargo, which might happen based on the firing by Putin of Dmitry Rogozin as head of Roscosmos. Rogozin had been the person who imposed the embargo. His removal suggests that Putin is trying to ease the tensions between the west and Russia, at least in the area of space.

Axiom signs deal with Hungary

Capitalism in space: Axiom yesterday announced a new agreement with Hungary aimed at launching that nation’s first astronaut to ISS.

Tthe plan is to have Axiom launch the astronaut on one of its planned tourist missions using a Dragon capsule. Whether the mission will happen before or after Axiom begins launching its own modules to ISS is not clear, since no launch schedule was revealed.

Axiom now has deals with Hungary and the UAE to fly their astronauts, and deals with Italy and a UK company to add their own modules to its station. There is thus good financial pressure for it to get its station launched an operational, first as a section of ISS and then flying independently.

NASA sets tentative launch date for SLS

NASA yesterday announced that it is targeting August 29, 2022 for the first unmanned launch of its SLS rocket.

NASA is tentatively targeting Aug. 29 for the long-awaited maiden flight of the agency’s huge Space Launch System moon rocket, officials said Wednesday. But they cautioned major challenges remain for the oft-delayed rocket and an official date will not be set until later.

As it stands, the launch processing schedule is extremely tight and depends on successful checkout of a repaired hydrogen line fitting, good results from end-to-end pre-flight checks of the rocket’s myriad other systems and getting everything done in time to haul it back out to the launch pad by around Aug. 18.

If any delays occur, this launch window extends until September 6th. If they can’t make that date, the next launch window opens on September 19th.

The mission, to send the Orion capsule around the Moon and back, would last 42 days and if launched as planned would return October 10th.

The announcement also slipped in this tidbit:

If the initial test flight goes well, NASA plans to launch four astronauts atop the second SLS rocket for an around-the-moon shakedown flight in 2024 — Artemis 2 — before sending the first woman and the first person of color to a landing near the moon’s south pole in 2025 or 2026 as part of the Artemis 3 mission. [emphasis mine]

This I think is the first time NASA officials have hinted that the launch might be delayed to ’26. It is no surprise, but as they have always done with SLS, they give these hints softly, prepping the press so that it doesn’t make news.

As for the disgraceful unseemly focus on race and sex, it appears that NASA is now an apartheid state. The make-up of missions will no longer be determined by skill and experience, but by ethnic considerations, with favoritism always given to minorities or women.

Van Johnson – Flim Flam Floo

An evening pause: This song comes from the first full television movie, The Pied Piper of Hamelin, first aired on NBC in 1957, and then subsequently re-aired almost yearly for the next decade. If you want to watch it, it is available on the internet archive here.

I post it today because it is a perfect expression of the hopeful culture of the 1960s that made possible the Apollo 11 lunar landing that occurred fifty-three years ago today. As the song says, “The world is filled with wonderment and magic,” and then insists “You can find the beauty in all you perceive/Just believe that it’s there in view.”

I recently rediscovered this movie of my childhood, and was astonished to discover that though I hadn’t heard this song in more than fifty years, I remembered its message as if I had only watched it yesterday. Its message was what my parent’s generation believed, and tried with all their might to pass on to their children. Their belief made the Apollo 11 landing possible. Sadly, most of my baby boomer generation decided to reject this hopeful vision, thus producing the increasingly gloomy society we have today.

Let us work to recapture that wonder and hope. Only then can our children breathe free to achieve some true wonders of their own.

Thanks to Wayne Devette for clipping this song from the full movie for me.

Rogozin’s order banning Russian astronauts from using European robot arm cancelled

A planned spacewalk tomorrow to configure the new European robot arm on the Russian section of ISS essentally proves that the order by the recently fired head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, forbidding the station’s Russian astronauts from doing any work with that European robot arm has now been cancelled.

A Russian cosmonaut and an Italian astronaut are finalizing preparations for a spacewalk on Thursday to configure the International Space Station’s third and newest robotic arm. As the pair was being assisted by two cosmonauts the rest of the Expedition 67 crew ensured ongoing advanced space research was proceeding full speed ahead aboard the orbiting lab.

Station Commander Oleg Artemyev of Roscosmos and Flight Engineer Samantha Cristoforetti of ESA (European Space Agency) are scheduled to exit the space station into the vacuum of space at 10 a.m. EDT on Thursday. The spacewalkers will spend about seven hours readying the European robotic arm for operations on the station’s Russian segment. The duo will also deploy 10 nanosatellites to collect radio electronics data. [emphasis mine]

Though I suspect no official announcement will be made, it is likely that the new head of Roscosmos, Yuri Borisov, had quietly made it clear to all involved to proceed with the necessary work, as if Rogozin’s order had never been made.

Martian terraces

Overview map
Glacier country on Mars

Martian terraces
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on May 17, 2022 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists have labeled “Dipping layers against mound in Deuteronilus Mensae.”

Deuteronilus is the westernmost mensae region in the 2,000-mile-long strip of heavy glaciers found in the northern mid-latitudes that I dub glacier country. This photo, the location of which is marked by the white cross on the overview map above, is another example, though somewhat strange and puzzling. Normally the layers will dip away from the high point. Here, the layers dip towards the mound. I can think of only one explanation, that of prevailing winds causing the erosion in this unusual manner, but I also find that explanation very unsatisfactory.

The layers themselves illustrate the cycles that have shaped Martian geology, caused by the wide swings in the planet’s rotational tilt, from 11 to 60 degrees. When that tilt is high, the poles are warmer than the mid-latitudes, and water ice migrates from the poles towards the equator. When the tilt is low, the mid-latitudes are warmer, and the water ice heads back towards the poles. Thus, the many many layers the orbiters and rovers are now finding everywhere on Mars.

Right now scientists think, because Mars’ tilt is in the middle of these swings at 25 degrees, the planet is in equilibrium, with the water at the poles and mid-latitudes essentially going no where. This conclusion however is not yet confirmed.

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