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Unmanned Spaceflight.com _ MRO 2005 _ Mars Orbiter snaps boulder

Posted by: RichforMars Aug 13 2014, 07:48 PM

Hi there,

I read this on the NASA.gov site. Last month a tall boulder rolled five hundred meters, and tilted upright. There is no actual explanation as to why, seismic movement? Possibly the breeze of the wind. unsure.gif

I found the whole event interesting as the location is void and empty. Reminds me a little of the Rover and the peble.

http://www.nasa.gov/jpl/mro/boulder-rolls-down-martian-hill-20140813/index.html

Posted by: vikingmars Aug 14 2014, 01:32 PM

QUOTE (RichforMars @ Aug 13 2014, 09:48 PM) *
Hi there, I read this on the NASA.gov site. Last month a tall boulder rolled five hundred meters, and tilted upright. There is no actual explanation as to why, seismic movement? Possibly the breeze of the wind. unsure.gif I found the whole event interesting as the location is void and empty. Reminds me a little of the Rover and the peble.

Thanks a lot RichforMars for your info. Apparently this big bouder made some vibrations that dislodged some smaller rocks too ! But with tracks less visible...

Posted by: RichforMars Aug 14 2014, 02:43 PM

Interesting find, who realised that?

There is no actual Mars quake mission. So it remains a mystery for now.

Posted by: Explorer1 Aug 14 2014, 05:46 PM

There will be soon, Rich: http://insight.jpl.nasa.gov/home.cfm
It's the next one to launch!

Posted by: wildespace Aug 17 2014, 07:29 AM

Are there images of this area prior to the rolling event?

Posted by: nprev Aug 17 2014, 07:54 AM

Might also be interesting to search for a nearby recent impact; that might've been what jarred it loose.

In fact, such a find would be incredibly informative since it could tell us a lot about subsurface properties that relate to conduction of motion. The energy from an impact could be calculated reasonably well as a function of crater diameter, so that would be a terrific 'calibrated' stimulus.

Posted by: SpaceScout Aug 26 2014, 12:46 PM

QUOTE (RichforMars @ Aug 13 2014, 09:48 PM) *
I found the whole event interesting...

Sorry for this note, but boulders that moved downhill with tracks have been seen since the first very high resolution images of the moon. So I personally don't get why this image (surely a great HiRISE image, don't get me wrong) should get more attention than others.

Posted by: Phil Stooke Aug 26 2014, 01:43 PM

It's not getting more attention, it's just getting its turn in the limelight. Otherwise, I guess there is the 'monolith' appearance of the boulder with its shadow to draw a bit of extra attention. The thing is, if you want the privilege of frequent news releases (as we generally do) you have to accept quite a lot of repetition - another fresh crater, another skylight, etc. Keep 'em coming, I say.

Phil

Posted by: SpaceScout Aug 26 2014, 02:44 PM

Okay, I got the point. Perhaps I would have liked a more science-driven release. For example, I would have liked to learn about the science target of this image (I know many HiRISE images have one)

Cheers

Posted by: djellison Aug 26 2014, 02:56 PM

If you follow the links you'll get to the HiRISE team page for the observation
http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_037190_1765
Where it says
This image was targeted to cover part of a small “chaos” terrain, where there are lots of steep slopes.

Posted by: SpaceScout Aug 27 2014, 11:00 AM

Thank you for the link!

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