Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated and cropped to post here, was taken on June 17, 2022 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). The section highlighted is at full resolution, in order to make clear the absolutely crazy and complex terrain seen in the full image.

This terrain is not glacial, as the location is only about 1 degree south of the Martian equator. There might have been surface or near surface ice here once in the past, but there is none now.

Could we be looking at some form of lava flow? This is possible, because a close look at the context map at the image link suggests this region has been partly covered by some material, obscuring some craters to the east and west. However, there is no visible evidence anywhere in this region of a volcanic vent or caldera. If this covering material was volcanic it is very unclear where it came from.

The overview map below does not really provide any answers, but at least gives the context.

The white dot at the center of the map marks the location of these badlands, about 300 miles east of where the rover Opportunity roamed from 2004 to 2018. This area of Arabia Terra is dubbed Meridiani Planum, with a geology that suggests water was once present in some form.

My guess is that we are looking at the Martian equivalent of what Hawaiians dub as ʻaʻā (pronounced ‘ah ah’) lava, rough, sharp, and rocky lava that is very difficult to travel over. On Earth the clumps can be mere inches or feet across. In this photo they appear to be much larger, tens to hundreds of feet in diameter, though up close we might see the same rough features at a smaller scale.

Regardless of the geological origin, this terrain looks to be some of the most difficult on Mars to cross. In fact, I suspect exploring it will never be easy, even with helicopters.