A low mid-latitude crater on Mars apparently filled to overflowing with ice
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on June 18, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a steep 1,000-foot-high cliff with what appears to be extensive glacial material at its base.
The many layers all suggest past climate cycles, where snow was deposited and the glacier grew, followed by a period when no snow fell and the glacier either shrank or remained unchanged. The terraced nature of the layers near the base of the cliff suggest that with each active cycle less snow was deposited and the glacier grew less.
The latitude is 33 degrees south, which puts it just outside the dry equatorial regions of Mars and inside the mid-latitude region where many such glacial features are found. Its closeness to the tropics however is significant, because by this point we should be seeing a diminishment of such features. Instead, the wider view shows us that the near surface ice in this region is extensive and in fact appears to cover everything.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks this location, with the white rectangle in the inset showing the area covered by the picture above. The inset, created from a mosaic using the full global coverage of MRO’s context camera, also shows that this eight-mile-wide unnamed crater is practically filled with that glacial material, so much so that on its eastern margin it appears to have pushed the crater rim to the east in its effort to flow beyond.
Nor is that the only place where there is a lot of evidence of near surface ice. The mountain to the north, with a peak about 4,000 feet higher than the floor of the crater, is surrounded by an apron of glacial material, and the rough terrain to its immediate right resembles a broken ice sheet. The crater itself appears surrounded by a splash apron, and in wider views of the global context camera mosaic there are many other craters in all directions that are equally filled with icelike features.
The location, in the mountains to the northwest of Hellas Basin, might explain the extensive ice. The prevailing winds here come from the south out from the basin, and might bring with cold air that helps ice form and survive.
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Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on June 18, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a steep 1,000-foot-high cliff with what appears to be extensive glacial material at its base.
The many layers all suggest past climate cycles, where snow was deposited and the glacier grew, followed by a period when no snow fell and the glacier either shrank or remained unchanged. The terraced nature of the layers near the base of the cliff suggest that with each active cycle less snow was deposited and the glacier grew less.
The latitude is 33 degrees south, which puts it just outside the dry equatorial regions of Mars and inside the mid-latitude region where many such glacial features are found. Its closeness to the tropics however is significant, because by this point we should be seeing a diminishment of such features. Instead, the wider view shows us that the near surface ice in this region is extensive and in fact appears to cover everything.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks this location, with the white rectangle in the inset showing the area covered by the picture above. The inset, created from a mosaic using the full global coverage of MRO’s context camera, also shows that this eight-mile-wide unnamed crater is practically filled with that glacial material, so much so that on its eastern margin it appears to have pushed the crater rim to the east in its effort to flow beyond.
Nor is that the only place where there is a lot of evidence of near surface ice. The mountain to the north, with a peak about 4,000 feet higher than the floor of the crater, is surrounded by an apron of glacial material, and the rough terrain to its immediate right resembles a broken ice sheet. The crater itself appears surrounded by a splash apron, and in wider views of the global context camera mosaic there are many other craters in all directions that are equally filled with icelike features.
The location, in the mountains to the northwest of Hellas Basin, might explain the extensive ice. The prevailing winds here come from the south out from the basin, and might bring with cold air that helps ice form and survive.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows 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. 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. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally 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.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four 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 or subscription:
4. 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.
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