Thick windblown ash in Mars’ largest mountain region
Click for original picture.
The cool image to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on September 1, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), and shows what the scientists label as “Erosional Features on Olympus Mons.”
What is eroding? Based on the picture itself the first guess is volcanic ash, as these features strongly resemble the many features seen in the Medusae Fossae Formation, the largest volcanic ash field on Mars — about the size of the subcontinent of India.
Medusae however is many thousand miles away, and is not apparently related to any specific volcano. These features are instead directly linked to Olympus Mons, the largest known volcano in the solar system. However, much of the terrain for many hundreds of miles around Olympus is covered with flood lava, which was deposited and hardened quickly to form smooth featureless plains that have resisted much erosion over the eons. Here the terrain is clearly eroded, which suggests that if the material here is volcanic, it was laid down not by flood lava but by falling ash that got compressed but was easily friable and could be blown away by the winds of Mars’ thin atmosphere.
The red dot on the overview map to the right marks the location of this picture, in the center of the mountain region known as Lycus Sulci, the most extensive range of mountains on the Red Planet, about 1,400 mile wide and 1,800 miles long.
At present scientists are unsure of the geology that formed Lycus Sulci, and how it is linked with Olympus Mons. This picture however appears to be an attempt to solve that question. Its features also resemble a region south of Olympus Mons, and suggest that both are the ash remains of one or many of the volcano’s major eruptions. If so, the ash from those eruptions forms the many layers at this site, but its age has caused the top layers to be eroded significantly by the prevailing winds.
This picture, the picture of similar features south of Olympus, and the large size of Lycus Sulci all suggest that some of the eruptions of Olympus were inconceivably powerful explosive events, spreading gigantic amounts of ash across many thousands of miles of Mars. This possibility makes the past history of Mars even more alien. As alien from Earth as it is now, it was even stranger in the far past, a billion-plus years ago.
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:
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Click for original picture.
The cool image to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on September 1, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), and shows what the scientists label as “Erosional Features on Olympus Mons.”
What is eroding? Based on the picture itself the first guess is volcanic ash, as these features strongly resemble the many features seen in the Medusae Fossae Formation, the largest volcanic ash field on Mars — about the size of the subcontinent of India.
Medusae however is many thousand miles away, and is not apparently related to any specific volcano. These features are instead directly linked to Olympus Mons, the largest known volcano in the solar system. However, much of the terrain for many hundreds of miles around Olympus is covered with flood lava, which was deposited and hardened quickly to form smooth featureless plains that have resisted much erosion over the eons. Here the terrain is clearly eroded, which suggests that if the material here is volcanic, it was laid down not by flood lava but by falling ash that got compressed but was easily friable and could be blown away by the winds of Mars’ thin atmosphere.
The red dot on the overview map to the right marks the location of this picture, in the center of the mountain region known as Lycus Sulci, the most extensive range of mountains on the Red Planet, about 1,400 mile wide and 1,800 miles long.
At present scientists are unsure of the geology that formed Lycus Sulci, and how it is linked with Olympus Mons. This picture however appears to be an attempt to solve that question. Its features also resemble a region south of Olympus Mons, and suggest that both are the ash remains of one or many of the volcano’s major eruptions. If so, the ash from those eruptions forms the many layers at this site, but its age has caused the top layers to be eroded significantly by the prevailing winds.
This picture, the picture of similar features south of Olympus, and the large size of Lycus Sulci all suggest that some of the eruptions of Olympus were inconceivably powerful explosive events, spreading gigantic amounts of ash across many thousands of miles of Mars. This possibility makes the past history of Mars even more alien. As alien from Earth as it is now, it was even stranger in the far past, a billion-plus years ago.
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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