The very tip of a thousand-mile-long crack on Mars
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on June 22, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists label as “The tip of Cerberus Fossae,” a thousand-mile-long crack in the surface of Mars formed when the ground was pulled apart by underground forces.
If you look closely at the picture’s right edge, you can see that beyond the end of the fissure it actually continues but appears filled with material. In the full picture this however is the end of the crack. Beyond this point the ground is as smooth and as generally featureless as seen within the picture itself, and as also shown in this MRO context camera view of the same area.
Cerberus Fossae is actually three parallel cracks, with this the northernmost one. The eastern tip of the middle crack was previously highlighted in a cool image in July 2022.
The white dot in the inset shows the location, in the middle of a lava flood plain. This flood lava covered everything, filling in the older topography and craters so that all we have now is this flat plain with minor changes left over from the lava flows. The cracks of Cerberus Fossae then followed, splitting the lava for a thousand miles.
Everything seen here however is thought to be very young, for Mars. Based on crater counts the lava flows are thought to be two to ten million years old, though some lava flows could be as young as 50,000 years. The cracks came after.
In fact, the cracks are likely still spreading. Note the white splotches to the west, marking the locations of the largest quakes detected by InSight’s seismometer when it was still functioning on Mars. This is a region where some underground stresses are causing quakes, which in turn are probably helping to pull those cracks apart.
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, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on June 22, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists label as “The tip of Cerberus Fossae,” a thousand-mile-long crack in the surface of Mars formed when the ground was pulled apart by underground forces.
If you look closely at the picture’s right edge, you can see that beyond the end of the fissure it actually continues but appears filled with material. In the full picture this however is the end of the crack. Beyond this point the ground is as smooth and as generally featureless as seen within the picture itself, and as also shown in this MRO context camera view of the same area.
Cerberus Fossae is actually three parallel cracks, with this the northernmost one. The eastern tip of the middle crack was previously highlighted in a cool image in July 2022.
The white dot in the inset shows the location, in the middle of a lava flood plain. This flood lava covered everything, filling in the older topography and craters so that all we have now is this flat plain with minor changes left over from the lava flows. The cracks of Cerberus Fossae then followed, splitting the lava for a thousand miles.
Everything seen here however is thought to be very young, for Mars. Based on crater counts the lava flows are thought to be two to ten million years old, though some lava flows could be as young as 50,000 years. The cracks came after.
In fact, the cracks are likely still spreading. Note the white splotches to the west, marking the locations of the largest quakes detected by InSight’s seismometer when it was still functioning on Mars. This is a region where some underground stresses are causing quakes, which in turn are probably helping to pull those cracks apart.
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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