Jumbled floor of ancient Martian channel
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 2, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
At first glance I thought I was looking at a variety of eroding glacial flows. I was completely wrong. This terrain is located on the floor of 900-mile-long Ares Vallis, thought to have been carved eons ago by some flow, either liquid catastrophic floods or glacial ice, but is now located in the very dry equatorial regions of Mars.
Then what caused these meandering ridges? The overview map below, plus the wider view of MRO’s context camera, provides us more data but little illumination. In fact, both leave us more questions and mysteries.
Click for original image.
The white dot on the overview map to the right, in Ares Vallis south of where Pathfinder landed and where Franklin will land hopefully in 2028, marks this location. As I noted, this is in the dry equatorial regions. If there was surface or near-surface ice or water here once, it is no longer evident. These ridges are bedrock of some kind, though some form of erosion has shaped them.
The second image to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on November 8, 2012 by MRO’s context camera. The white box marks the area covered by the high resolution image above.
Note how almost all the terrain appears to have no relation to the general downward grade of Ares Vallis. There are hints of a southeast-to-northwest trend, but only in some areas and only vaguely.
Yet, this terrain is in the floor of this channel, and was carved by whatever once flowed through it, traveling from the southeast to the northwest. The random shapes we see now must be from some subsequent erosion process, possibly associated with any near surface ice that might have once existed here but certainly related to later wind erosion. According to the science team for Mars Express, referring to similar terrain much farther upstream in Ares Vallis:
A chaotic distribution of individual blocks of rock and hills forms a disrupted pattern. These ‘knobs’ are several hundred metres high. Scientists suggest that they are remnants of a pre-existing landscape that collapsed after cavities had formed beneath the surface.
The blocks and hills in that upstream region however show more evidence of the downstream flow. It could be that by the time that flow reached the region in today’s pictures the force of the flow had dissipated somewhat so that the terrain no longer shows as much evidence of it.
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.
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 2, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
At first glance I thought I was looking at a variety of eroding glacial flows. I was completely wrong. This terrain is located on the floor of 900-mile-long Ares Vallis, thought to have been carved eons ago by some flow, either liquid catastrophic floods or glacial ice, but is now located in the very dry equatorial regions of Mars.
Then what caused these meandering ridges? The overview map below, plus the wider view of MRO’s context camera, provides us more data but little illumination. In fact, both leave us more questions and mysteries.
Click for original image.
The white dot on the overview map to the right, in Ares Vallis south of where Pathfinder landed and where Franklin will land hopefully in 2028, marks this location. As I noted, this is in the dry equatorial regions. If there was surface or near-surface ice or water here once, it is no longer evident. These ridges are bedrock of some kind, though some form of erosion has shaped them.
The second image to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on November 8, 2012 by MRO’s context camera. The white box marks the area covered by the high resolution image above.
Note how almost all the terrain appears to have no relation to the general downward grade of Ares Vallis. There are hints of a southeast-to-northwest trend, but only in some areas and only vaguely.
Yet, this terrain is in the floor of this channel, and was carved by whatever once flowed through it, traveling from the southeast to the northwest. The random shapes we see now must be from some subsequent erosion process, possibly associated with any near surface ice that might have once existed here but certainly related to later wind erosion. According to the science team for Mars Express, referring to similar terrain much farther upstream in Ares Vallis:
A chaotic distribution of individual blocks of rock and hills forms a disrupted pattern. These ‘knobs’ are several hundred metres high. Scientists suggest that they are remnants of a pre-existing landscape that collapsed after cavities had formed beneath the surface.
The blocks and hills in that upstream region however show more evidence of the downstream flow. It could be that by the time that flow reached the region in today’s pictures the force of the flow had dissipated somewhat so that the terrain no longer shows as much evidence of it.
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.
Readers: the rules for commenting!
No registration is required. I welcome all opinions, even those that strongly criticize my commentary.
However, name-calling and obscenities will not be tolerated. First time offenders who are new to the site will be warned. Second time offenders or first time offenders who have been here awhile will be suspended for a week. After that, I will ban you. Period.
Note also that first time commenters as well as any comment with more than one link will be placed in moderation for my approval. Be patient, I will get to it.