Mining Mars
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on May 22, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). The picture’s focus of study is the bright strip running diagonally across the center, which the scientists label as a “linear feature exposure of infrared-bright material.”
This bright strip with all the swirls of alternating light and dark terrain is a fissure about 80 feet deep. What is interesting is that the parallel bright features to the north and south are actually ridges, not depressions, even though there appears to be some resemblance between them all. (Note that the patches of very thin parallel lines are likely ripple dunes sitting on top of the topography.)
So, what created this fissure? And why is its inner surface so strange? As is usually the case, a wider look provides some clues.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, about 35-50 miles south of the rim of Valles Marineris. The small rectangle in the inset indicates the area covered by the picture above, and shows that this fissure is only a tiny example of a series of parallel much larger fissures, dubbed Sinai Fossae, all of which are located on a 100-mile-wide bulge dubbed Sinai Dorsa that stretches 200 miles to the south where it meets up with a high point dubbed Sinai Tholus that appears to have been a source of volcanic flood lava.
Thus we can speculate that upward pressure from magma under Sinai Tholus pushed up the bulge, causing cracks to form within which bubbled lava. In the specific fissure above, when that lava froze it did so while it swirled about, with the outer edges hardening first. Thus the alternating bands of light and dark.
More important, the orbital data that finds this fissure to be very bright in the infrared suggests those swirls likely contain a lot of mineralized material, making this a potential valuable mining location. Global orbital data has found a lot of hydrated sulfates both here as well as permeating the south slopes and floor of nearby Valles Marineris. The “hydrated” nature of these sulfates tells us that water was somehow involved in their formation. Their “sulfate” nature tells us that there is likely a lot of valuable minerals located here as well.
Thus, this region is likely going to an important mining region for future settlers.
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.
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3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
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c/o Robert Zimmerman
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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, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on May 22, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). The picture’s focus of study is the bright strip running diagonally across the center, which the scientists label as a “linear feature exposure of infrared-bright material.”
This bright strip with all the swirls of alternating light and dark terrain is a fissure about 80 feet deep. What is interesting is that the parallel bright features to the north and south are actually ridges, not depressions, even though there appears to be some resemblance between them all. (Note that the patches of very thin parallel lines are likely ripple dunes sitting on top of the topography.)
So, what created this fissure? And why is its inner surface so strange? As is usually the case, a wider look provides some clues.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, about 35-50 miles south of the rim of Valles Marineris. The small rectangle in the inset indicates the area covered by the picture above, and shows that this fissure is only a tiny example of a series of parallel much larger fissures, dubbed Sinai Fossae, all of which are located on a 100-mile-wide bulge dubbed Sinai Dorsa that stretches 200 miles to the south where it meets up with a high point dubbed Sinai Tholus that appears to have been a source of volcanic flood lava.
Thus we can speculate that upward pressure from magma under Sinai Tholus pushed up the bulge, causing cracks to form within which bubbled lava. In the specific fissure above, when that lava froze it did so while it swirled about, with the outer edges hardening first. Thus the alternating bands of light and dark.
More important, the orbital data that finds this fissure to be very bright in the infrared suggests those swirls likely contain a lot of mineralized material, making this a potential valuable mining location. Global orbital data has found a lot of hydrated sulfates both here as well as permeating the south slopes and floor of nearby Valles Marineris. The “hydrated” nature of these sulfates tells us that water was somehow involved in their formation. Their “sulfate” nature tells us that there is likely a lot of valuable minerals located here as well.
Thus, this region is likely going to an important mining region for future settlers.
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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