MSL landing sites Options

[peter59]

Ranking

Eberswalde 44,53
Holden 43,20
Gale 41,95
Mawrth 37,92
Nili 37,08
S Meridiani 28,30
Miyamoto 23,84

Eberswalde on top ? Why not Gale or Holden?

[Tman]

They are still recommendations. But could it means the last three are droped out at least?

Go Gale! MSL will be a high mountain climber

[ustrax]

They are still recommendations. But could it means the last three are droped out at least?

Not definitely, but Miyamoto is in a really bad position...
The Nili Fossae site and South Meridiani still have a slight chance of making it since Holden and Eberswalde are locations quite close to each other, this will, probably, left one of these out of the final selection.

[djellison]

Damn you HRSC - two observations of it, and neither have colour....anyhooo

http://pds-geosciences.wustl.edu/mex/mex-m...27_0000_nd4.jpg

GO GALE. BEAT HOLDEN.

Doug

[ustrax]

Damn you HRSC - two observations of it, and neither have colour....anyhooo

Some nice anaglyphs here Doug...

[ngunn]

I've got a couple of simple (simplistic?) questions about the Gale crater central peak. Why is it so much higher than the crater rim, and why is it so neatly stratified? I've read about the supposed burial and exhumation, but if that mountain consists of sediments all the way down then surely it's not a central peak in the usual sense at all? Is it really a sort of residual mesa that is located in the middle of Gale purely by chance?

I thought central peaks in craters were normally chaotically jumbled piles of uplifted material, usually a bit lower than the crater rim. Can someone explain briefly what's hypothesised to be going on here or point me to a (not too technical) reference?

[djellison]

There's plenty of PDF's on the meeting website that talk about Gale and explain a possible history of it - most of which I don't understand ( my favoritism is purely down to aesthetics ) - but from what I do understand it's not a central peak in the way one thinks of a normal central peak ( being formed at impact ) - but has been built up since.

[climber]

MSL will be a high mountain climber

I'd love it

[peter59]

MSL landing site should be scientifically valuable, but should be spectacular also. Eberswalde is not very spectacular, Holden and Gale are spectacular. In case of similar scientific value, important PR aspect should be taken into consideration. Potential disappointment of simple US taxpayer can decrease support for next Mars missions.

[ngunn]

There's plenty of PDF's on the meeting website that talk about Gale

Thanks Doug. This 57 MB monster - http://marsoweb.nas.nasa.gov/landingsites/...Sumner_Gale.pdf
has a nice squence of diagrams. So there was no impact related central peak, the feature is all sediments, a remnant of layers that once buried Gale crater entirely. But what I still don't get is why or how a crater would empty of sediments except for one huge mound remaining right bang in the middle. Did something make the sediments there peculiarly resistant to erosion? Was there some residual volcanic or geothermal activity located near the centre of Gale that persisted for long aeons after the impact, subtly altering the sediments? My mind is wandering to the Columbia Hills . .

[djellison]

Did something make the sediments there peculiarly resistant to erosion? Was there some residual volcanic or geothermal activity located near the centre of Gale that persisted for long aeons after the impact, subtly altering the sediments?

Exactly. Let's send MSL and find out

[Tman]

MSL landing site should be scientifically valuable, but should be spectacular also. Eberswalde is not very spectacular, Holden and Gale are spectacular.

In terms of spectacular views may Eberswalde pale, but in terms of to be the most spectacular delta on Mars that probably grew in long-standing water does Eberswalde glint. To enthuse they have only to show similar delta pictures from Earth along with the explanation that large deltas are great places for life... ok probably better not, but that there is a high potential for preserved organic matter. And that crater is older than Holden.

[JRehling]

I've got a couple of simple (simplistic?) questions about the Gale crater central peak. Why is it so much higher than the crater rim

I don't know who else might believe this, but for a long time, I've thought that the story is that we have a surface that became moist (in certain seasons/epochs), leaving some salty water there for blowing dust to land on. When the water froze or evaporated, the dust grains were cemented in place. If this dynamic could be sustained, for some reason favoring this surface over other surface types, you could get runaway growth.

[monitorlizard]

I like the geology of Holden Crater and was glad to see it make the top three candidates list. However, there has been some talk in the past of the site being too cold for full operation at the time of landing. In the "Second MSL Landing Site Workshop" thread, tglotch said this in post #28:

"Holden and Terby came very close to not making the final list. They are both very interesting scientifically, but we were told by engineers that because of their high southern latitudes and cold temperatures that if MSL landed at one of those sites it would have to lie dormant for the first month or so and then operate at only a 30-50% duty cycle."

Was anything said of this at the Third Workshop? And just out of curiosity, is there some reason why RHUs (radioisotope heater units) couldn't be used instead of electrical heaters for areas not warmed by the RTG waste heat on MSL? Wouldn't that allow for less dormancy after landing?

[mcaplinger]

And just out of curiosity, is there some reason why RHUs (radioisotope heater units) couldn't be used instead of electrical heaters for areas not warmed by the RTG waste heat on MSL?

Those areas are outside the rover body and there's no obvious way that RHUs could heat them without lots of additional mass and volume for insulating enclosures of some sort.