Martian impacts and streaks
Click for full image.
In the most recent image download from the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), there was the cool image to the right, reduced and cropped to post here, of a crater that appeared to have hundreds and hundreds of slope streaks along its inner slopes.
Slope streaks are quite mysterious. They are found in the equatorial regions as dark (though sometimes light) streaks on steep slopes, appearing throughout the year and slowly fading over time. They also appear to be a geological phenomenon unique to Mars. Nothing on Earth or any other planet appears to correspond.
As such, their nature and cause remains unknown, though there are a bunch of theories, with the most popular being that these are a kind of dust avalanche. They are always found in connection with dust-covered terrain, but they also make no significant topological change to the surface, other than brightness.
The slope streaks in this crater are especially intriguing, because of the number of streaks. In digging further into the MRO archive I found a number of images of this crater and its surrounding terrain. It appears that sometime before 2012 there was a relatively recent impact close to the exterior of the eastern rim of this crater. The image below, taken in 2014 by MRO, shows this impact as the large dark splotch, with the new crater indicated by the arrow..
Click for full image.
The small arrows near the bottom left indicate matching features on the center-right of the image above, to show the relative location of this impact to all the slope streaks.
Most of the photographs of this impact are labeled as monitoring the recent impact, not the slope streaks. It appears that the goal of these images is to see if there is some relationship between the impact and the slope streaks. Since one cause of streaks is thought to be a rockfall at the top that triggers the streak, it might be that the impact triggered almost all of these streaks, at one time, with later sporadic rockfalls (due to the relative instability of the recently shaken surface) causing later streaks.
When I asked Misha Kreslavsky of the University of California in Santa Cruz to look at this new image, he was able to spot two new streaks, one very tiny, with the second larger streak indicated by black arrow on the left center of the first image above. He also noted that, “it looks like many streaks here are formed during ‘streak showers,’ short active periods separated by long periods of low formation rate.” This speculation on his part confirms the possibility that the majority of these streaks occurred at one time, when the impact hit.
At the same time, he added, “I don’t think that all those abundant slope streaks had been triggered by this impact: They have different shades of gray, probably they are of different age. But the impact could indeed triggered a bunch of streaks.”
Click for full image.
A wider lower resolution image of the entire crater, taken in 2012 by the context camera on MRO and cropped to post here on the right, provides further support for the impact cause. Note how most of the streaks are on the crater’s eastern interior, nearest the impact.
I imagine this scenario. When the bolide smashed down, the tremors and small secondary impacts that are documented in all directions around the crater, immediately caused a streak shower, mostly on the nearest slopes of the crater.
That the streaks only occurred on the inside of the crater also illustrates once again their unusual nature. They occurred in the dusty areas inside the crater, not on its outside rim where there is not as much dust.
The support of my readers through the years has given 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. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
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. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to 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.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
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Click for full image.
In the most recent image download from the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), there was the cool image to the right, reduced and cropped to post here, of a crater that appeared to have hundreds and hundreds of slope streaks along its inner slopes.
Slope streaks are quite mysterious. They are found in the equatorial regions as dark (though sometimes light) streaks on steep slopes, appearing throughout the year and slowly fading over time. They also appear to be a geological phenomenon unique to Mars. Nothing on Earth or any other planet appears to correspond.
As such, their nature and cause remains unknown, though there are a bunch of theories, with the most popular being that these are a kind of dust avalanche. They are always found in connection with dust-covered terrain, but they also make no significant topological change to the surface, other than brightness.
The slope streaks in this crater are especially intriguing, because of the number of streaks. In digging further into the MRO archive I found a number of images of this crater and its surrounding terrain. It appears that sometime before 2012 there was a relatively recent impact close to the exterior of the eastern rim of this crater. The image below, taken in 2014 by MRO, shows this impact as the large dark splotch, with the new crater indicated by the arrow..
Click for full image.
The small arrows near the bottom left indicate matching features on the center-right of the image above, to show the relative location of this impact to all the slope streaks.
Most of the photographs of this impact are labeled as monitoring the recent impact, not the slope streaks. It appears that the goal of these images is to see if there is some relationship between the impact and the slope streaks. Since one cause of streaks is thought to be a rockfall at the top that triggers the streak, it might be that the impact triggered almost all of these streaks, at one time, with later sporadic rockfalls (due to the relative instability of the recently shaken surface) causing later streaks.
When I asked Misha Kreslavsky of the University of California in Santa Cruz to look at this new image, he was able to spot two new streaks, one very tiny, with the second larger streak indicated by black arrow on the left center of the first image above. He also noted that, “it looks like many streaks here are formed during ‘streak showers,’ short active periods separated by long periods of low formation rate.” This speculation on his part confirms the possibility that the majority of these streaks occurred at one time, when the impact hit.
At the same time, he added, “I don’t think that all those abundant slope streaks had been triggered by this impact: They have different shades of gray, probably they are of different age. But the impact could indeed triggered a bunch of streaks.”
Click for full image.
A wider lower resolution image of the entire crater, taken in 2012 by the context camera on MRO and cropped to post here on the right, provides further support for the impact cause. Note how most of the streaks are on the crater’s eastern interior, nearest the impact.
I imagine this scenario. When the bolide smashed down, the tremors and small secondary impacts that are documented in all directions around the crater, immediately caused a streak shower, mostly on the nearest slopes of the crater.
That the streaks only occurred on the inside of the crater also illustrates once again their unusual nature. They occurred in the dusty areas inside the crater, not on its outside rim where there is not as much dust.
The support of my readers through the years has given 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. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
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. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to 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.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five 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:
5. 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. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Truly Dizzying !