Endeavour Crater, And again shall we conquer the Remoteness |
Endeavour Crater, And again shall we conquer the Remoteness |
Sep 29 2008, 03:13 PM
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Special Cookie Group: Members Posts: 2168 Joined: 6-April 05 From: Sintra | Portugal Member No.: 228 |
Opportunity is getting ready to embark on her most extraordinary journey, a true rover epic.
As information regarding how to win the distance are being collected here, and the emotional last views from Victoria Crater are being discussed here, I thought about creating a new thread that will surely become an obligatory stop as the tall peaks and other features of Endeavour start to rise in the horizon. Here we will be able to discuss the location of features seen from the distance, references that will help us understanding better what we are seing and that will, fortunately, feed our spirit across the long sail across the Meridiani sandwaves. Ultreya! I give it a kick with this navcam image, comparing it with Astro0's original (beautiful...) image: I'm sure James Canvin will correct me... EDITED: I can't resist...I tried! I honestly tried, but it is stronger than me...so many features ahead and not a single name?! Seriously, at Victoria we had features named after places visited by the vessel, and now for Endeavour? Assuming that Oppy will succeed on her quest will the mission keep the same policy, of naming places after Endeavour's tour? If so, there may be some names in common with Victoria... While we are ready to leave the port once more I remembered that we could start naming, internally, (in order to have catchier landmark references... ) these features, as they loom in the horizon, after the ship's crew. We could follow the order presented here. Let me just edit the image up there... -------------------- "Ride, boldly ride," The shade replied, "If you seek for Eldorado!"
Edgar Alan Poe |
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Jun 2 2009, 08:10 PM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 146 Joined: 31-October 08 Member No.: 4473 |
In trying to understand Meridiani and the Endeavor rim, I keep the following things in mind...
1) The profound ancientness of the Martian surface. 2) The significant variability of the Martian atmosphere. Perhaps a third of it freezes and sublimates yearly, plus secular orbital and axis changes indicate periods of different conditions over time, plus injections and depletions by volcanoes and large impacts, plus highly variable dust content further obscures the issue. The presence all over Mars of ventiform terrain features whose formation is beyond the transport capability of the current atmosphere underscores this. 3) Any surface water would likely be either ice or ice-covered most (if not all) of the time, even in ancient Mars. Ice-dominated or periglacial shorelines is what one is likely to see. For Meridiani, the interplay between surface ice and very concentrated brine underneath is important to consider. So, with the above in mind, I follow the rovers and the orbiters, and try to see how various ideas fit with the unfolding observations. One of the things I keep thinking about it the "planed-carved-like" slopes in Victoria crater. The surface around the rim was either flat, a planed-down slope of 15-35 degrees, a cliff, or debris beneath a cliff. If the surface was covered by ice sheets that were seasonally mobilized by brine at their base, these ice sheets (or their large cracked pieces) would creep down slopes and effectively plane them. Did this ice come from seepage from below or from precipitation from the atmosphere? Was Meridiani always equatorial? Fun questions. Seeing the rim deposits of Endeavor may shed some light on this. Or pose more questions. |
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