Hardened dunes or eroded lava?
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on August 4, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It is labeled as a “terrain sample,” so it likely was taken not as part of any specific research project but to fill a gap in the schedule in order to maintain the camera’s proper temperature.
The picture shows a flat rippled plain with a handful of very small thin ridges, oriented 90 degrees from the smaller ripples and sticking up a few feet above them.
The rough surface of the small ripples suggest these are dunes of sand that have hardened into rock. The thin larger ridges suggest an underlying topography buried by the sand. The dunes however might not be dunes at all, as indicated by their location.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, on the western edge of a 400-mile-wide region of parallel ridges dubbed Gigas Sulci (as outlined by the black line). While planetary scientists think the smaller ripples in the hollows of this region are dunes, the shape and placement of the entire region suggests its creation is related to an eruption that occurred from Olympus Mons, or from its southeastern flanks.
If so, it could be that the hollows are not hardened sand dunes but ancient dunes of volcanic ash that has been eroded over time. The larger ridges meanwhile are likely flood lava that covered the region in a much earlier volcanic event and is now largely buried by that sand or ash.
Why that flood lava hardened into these vertical ridges is unclear. Maybe it too got eroded over time to produce this stippled surface that is now mostly buried by ash.
Or maybe not. The geology here is really more complicated than I can figure.
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:
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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 August 4, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It is labeled as a “terrain sample,” so it likely was taken not as part of any specific research project but to fill a gap in the schedule in order to maintain the camera’s proper temperature.
The picture shows a flat rippled plain with a handful of very small thin ridges, oriented 90 degrees from the smaller ripples and sticking up a few feet above them.
The rough surface of the small ripples suggest these are dunes of sand that have hardened into rock. The thin larger ridges suggest an underlying topography buried by the sand. The dunes however might not be dunes at all, as indicated by their location.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, on the western edge of a 400-mile-wide region of parallel ridges dubbed Gigas Sulci (as outlined by the black line). While planetary scientists think the smaller ripples in the hollows of this region are dunes, the shape and placement of the entire region suggests its creation is related to an eruption that occurred from Olympus Mons, or from its southeastern flanks.
If so, it could be that the hollows are not hardened sand dunes but ancient dunes of volcanic ash that has been eroded over time. The larger ridges meanwhile are likely flood lava that covered the region in a much earlier volcanic event and is now largely buried by that sand or ash.
Why that flood lava hardened into these vertical ridges is unclear. Maybe it too got eroded over time to produce this stippled surface that is now mostly buried by ash.
Or maybe not. The geology here is really more complicated than I can figure.
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.
Seen this?
https://x.com/chrisramsay52/status/1885360546347672021
https://x.com/Radios4Freedom/status/1885548698064535956
Actual pictures or fakes?
Kevin: I am fairly certain those are actual pictures. Regardless, I don’t take the claims in the first seriously for many reasons:
1. It’s an old picture from Mars Global Surveyor, which did great work a quarter of a century ago but was not at the highest resolution.
2. The picture has clearly been doctored, in a manner to confirm the conclusions. When I adjust an image I always do it for the whole image, and not to make a uncertain theory more certain. I also always describe all changes. In this case Ramsey clearly changed the image to prove his point, in an unacceptable way, and made no mention of his changes.
3. No location for the image is provided. If you’re going to make such a claim you should allow others to easily check up on it. For example, what does more recent images show? And what does the original look like? As shown by the second link, the original picture looks nothing like the doctored one.
This kind of stupidity gets pushed all the time. I wish people would stop being so credulous.
And finally, reason number 4, the most important. If any Mars orbital picture had been detected any artificial structures suggesting alien life, it would be blasted loudly by the scientists involved. Such a discovery would be maybe the most important in the history of science. Why would any scientist keep it secret? The payoff for them in fame and glory would be priceless.