[X] My Assistant

[Julius]

Think we can kick off the new phase of exploration at Jezero.

[serpens]

Nice image Tau. There appears to be a transition in depositional environment from left to right with the distance between topsets and bottomsets narrowing with an apparent transition to a more energetic, turbulent flow. Unfortunately much of the transition point is obscured by detritus.

[StargazeInWonder]

Perhaps this was noted in earlier threads, but when we see a feature like this stand so tall above the surrounding plains, but cover such a small part of the area, that means that locally the erosion of other delta material must have been absolutely massive, right? And likely the only agent capable of carrying so much material away would have been catastrophic flooding, right? So while we see, in the hill and more generally in the delta layers built up by one era of water flow, there must have been subsequent eras (or episodes) of water flow that tore a lot of that down in the direction from the remaining delta material towards the center of the crater. Does that sound right or am I missing some other possible agent of erosion? Wind, impacts, and seismic activity from Syrtis Major seem like other possible agents in the destruction of the delta's original edge, but for so much material to be carried away, it seems like water had to be a major player.

[djellison]

And likely the only agent capable of carrying so much material away would have been catastrophic flooding, right?

Nope. Hundreds of millions of years and wind erosion are capable of this. See the best understood evolution of Gale Crater for similar massive volumes of wind erosion.

An incredibly slow mode of erosion, over incredibly long periods of time can literally vanish mountains.