Dramatic layers in Valles Marineris
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, and sharpened to post here, was taken on December 28, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), and shows one tiny section of the interior slope of the giant Martian canyon Valles Marineris.
The while layers are not made of frost or ice, because they are light tan, as per the color image. Thus, the alternating layers of dark and light indicate different layering events. The dark layers are probably major lava flood events with a lot of dark ash intermixed, while the tan layers were flood lava events with little dark ash.
The dark lines that cut across these layers are ripple dunes formed from dust that has accumulated inside Valles Marineris.
On the overview map above, the white dot in the central widest section of Valles Marineris that is dubbed Melas marks the location of this layered cliff. Though I do not have the precise numbers, the elevation change from the dark flats on the right and the mesa top on the left is probably somewhere about 3,000 feet, give or take 1,000 feet.
From the low point in this picture to the rim of Valles Marineris is an elevation rise of about 20,000 feet, most of which happens in a space of less than ten miles. This small slope is not part of that rise. Instead, it is merely a slope up to a rounded butte sitting in the interior of the canyon.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, and sharpened to post here, was taken on December 28, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), and shows one tiny section of the interior slope of the giant Martian canyon Valles Marineris.
The while layers are not made of frost or ice, because they are light tan, as per the color image. Thus, the alternating layers of dark and light indicate different layering events. The dark layers are probably major lava flood events with a lot of dark ash intermixed, while the tan layers were flood lava events with little dark ash.
The dark lines that cut across these layers are ripple dunes formed from dust that has accumulated inside Valles Marineris.
On the overview map above, the white dot in the central widest section of Valles Marineris that is dubbed Melas marks the location of this layered cliff. Though I do not have the precise numbers, the elevation change from the dark flats on the right and the mesa top on the left is probably somewhere about 3,000 feet, give or take 1,000 feet.
From the low point in this picture to the rim of Valles Marineris is an elevation rise of about 20,000 feet, most of which happens in a space of less than ten miles. This small slope is not part of that rise. Instead, it is merely a slope up to a rounded butte sitting in the interior of the canyon.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
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