Martian crater or mud caldera?
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on October 18, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
The scientists only call this a “feature,” likely because they don’t wish to guess as to its nature without more data. However, the 2.5 mile wide splash apron around the central double crater certainly merits a closer look. That double crater could be from impact, but it also could be a caldera, with the apron the result of material that flowed from the caldera.
That there appear to be fewer craters on the apron than on the surrounding terrain strengthens this last hypothesis. The apron would have erased many earlier impact craters, resulting in this lower count.
The location however suggests that if this feature was volcanic in origin it might not have been spewing out magma.
The red dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, about 125 miles west of the landing spot where Mars Pathfinder landed its small Sojourner rover in 1997. This location is inside Chryse Planitia, the northern lowland plains where scientists think the catastrophic floods from Valles Marineris drained, as suggested by the many streamlined mesas that surround this feature. Those features suggest a flow to the north. From this and other data some scientists theorize an intermittent inland sea once existed south of here, with an interrimittent northern ocean to the north, left behind by those floods.
In other words, those floods likely left the ground in this region soaked with water/ice for a period of time, which means we might be looking at a mud volcano, not a lava volcano.
Today, this region is in the Martian dry equatorial regions, where little near surface ice is found. This feature suggests however that water/ice was once here.
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, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on October 18, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
The scientists only call this a “feature,” likely because they don’t wish to guess as to its nature without more data. However, the 2.5 mile wide splash apron around the central double crater certainly merits a closer look. That double crater could be from impact, but it also could be a caldera, with the apron the result of material that flowed from the caldera.
That there appear to be fewer craters on the apron than on the surrounding terrain strengthens this last hypothesis. The apron would have erased many earlier impact craters, resulting in this lower count.
The location however suggests that if this feature was volcanic in origin it might not have been spewing out magma.
The red dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, about 125 miles west of the landing spot where Mars Pathfinder landed its small Sojourner rover in 1997. This location is inside Chryse Planitia, the northern lowland plains where scientists think the catastrophic floods from Valles Marineris drained, as suggested by the many streamlined mesas that surround this feature. Those features suggest a flow to the north. From this and other data some scientists theorize an intermittent inland sea once existed south of here, with an interrimittent northern ocean to the north, left behind by those floods.
In other words, those floods likely left the ground in this region soaked with water/ice for a period of time, which means we might be looking at a mud volcano, not a lava volcano.
Today, this region is in the Martian dry equatorial regions, where little near surface ice is found. This feature suggests however that water/ice was once here.
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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