Martian taffy terrain
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and enhanced to post here, was taken on April 11, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a typical area of what scientists have labeled “taffy terrain,” a landscape made up of strangely twisted bands that look like someone was pulling the ground repeatedly, just like taffy.
Based on the lower crater count found here, taffy terrain is thought to be relative young, formed around three billion years ago. While the exact formation process is not yet understood, scientists theorize that it was caused by some type of “viscous fluid” that settled into localized depressions.
The location is 40 degrees south latitude, so it is entirely possible we are seeing some form of glacial material, ice in these low spots that has no place to go but is warped over time by the same kind of tidal and rotational planetary effects that cause waves and tides in the oceans on Earth.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, on the eastern edge of the taffy terrain region inside Hellas Basin, what I like to call the basement of Mars.
This picture was likely taken to study the edge of the terrain, to try to determine a source for the taffy and thus determine its make-up. As far as I can see, however, there is no obvious place in this image or the full picture where this material is venting. Instead, it appears to be a sea of taffy being pulled and twisted by slow currents as it flows into the low spots.
Another geological mystery totally unique to Mars that will likely remain so until humans are walking the surface with rock hammers. If this is ice however it makes the floor of Hellas a very valuable piece of real estate, as it not only would have easily accessible water, but the lower elevation would give it a thicker atmosphere that provides a number of advantages.
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
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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 enhanced to post here, was taken on April 11, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a typical area of what scientists have labeled “taffy terrain,” a landscape made up of strangely twisted bands that look like someone was pulling the ground repeatedly, just like taffy.
Based on the lower crater count found here, taffy terrain is thought to be relative young, formed around three billion years ago. While the exact formation process is not yet understood, scientists theorize that it was caused by some type of “viscous fluid” that settled into localized depressions.
The location is 40 degrees south latitude, so it is entirely possible we are seeing some form of glacial material, ice in these low spots that has no place to go but is warped over time by the same kind of tidal and rotational planetary effects that cause waves and tides in the oceans on Earth.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, on the eastern edge of the taffy terrain region inside Hellas Basin, what I like to call the basement of Mars.
This picture was likely taken to study the edge of the terrain, to try to determine a source for the taffy and thus determine its make-up. As far as I can see, however, there is no obvious place in this image or the full picture where this material is venting. Instead, it appears to be a sea of taffy being pulled and twisted by slow currents as it flows into the low spots.
Another geological mystery totally unique to Mars that will likely remain so until humans are walking the surface with rock hammers. If this is ice however it makes the floor of Hellas a very valuable piece of real estate, as it not only would have easily accessible water, but the lower elevation would give it a thicker atmosphere that provides a number of advantages.
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.
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