US, WASHINGTON (ORDO NEWS) — This summer, China, the United States, and the UAE have successfully launched their spacecraft to Mars, which will enter the orbit of the Red Planet in February 2021.
Land of Arabia: dunes and crater ridges
This is part of the base of an impact crater in the Arvia Land region in the south of the Great Northern Plain. Most of the crater’s surface is covered with dark dune sand. The bright hills represent sedimentary rock that was “squeezed out” during the fall of the meteorite.
At the very beginning of the video, you will see red-orange sand, which was successfully illuminated by the Sun at the time of taking the pictures. Towards the end of this video, you will be able to observe the black dunes that appeared as a result of global storms.
South Pole: Dunes and Layered Sediments
At the beginning of this video, you will be able to see clouds that slightly obstruct the view, hiding snow cover underneath.
This region of Mars appeared in the course of the redistribution of ice masses in the distant past: the ice cap of the South Pole, increasing in size, pressed on the surface covered with sand, displacing the soil to the north.
Near the Rell Valley: ancient riverbeds
All available data indicate that these specific depressions, filled with sand, clay, sandstone, and other sedimentary rocks, were created by the impact of water currents.
Just imagine: turbulent streams of rivers running from northeast to southwest to the Rell Valley and flowing into a huge lake in the Hellas Plain – a rounded lowland of shock origin in the southern hemisphere of Mars.
Dark material at the bottom of the crater
Before you are the base of a relatively small, but fairly ancient crater, which is located in the northern part of Mars. Most of the crater bottom is covered with the usual reddish-brown sand, but in one place there is a dark blotch that grows into black dunes.
As you know, black sand is of volcanic origin. Most likely, in the distant past, this crater was a lake, into which lava fell, hardened, and gradually collapsed into many small particles, turning into sand.
Subpolar region Promethei Rupes
Here is Promethea Rupes – a mysterious region located near the south pole of Mars, characterized by the presence of a large amount of carbon dioxide in the solid phase with an admixture of water ice and dust.
A fairly promising place for the construction of a colony for two reasons: firstly, in summer the temperature rises to +20 degrees Celsius. Secondly, there are deposits of ice, which is necessary to obtain water and oxygen.
An ancient mountain slope in the center of an impact crater
In the distant past, the Great Northern Plain of Mars was probably covered by a vast ocean, into which stormy rivers flowed. In the east of one of the giant deltas is an impact crater, in the center of which rises a mountain.
Since the crater was formed where there was once a lot of water, its chemical composition is almost identical to the composition of the areas that represent the beds of the dried rivers of Mars.
Rabe crater cascade dunes
Before you are the slopes and dunes of the 108-kilometer Rabe crater, which is located in the quadrangle of Noah’s Land, 320 kilometers west of the Hellas Plain impact basin, halfway between the equator of Mars and its South Pole.
Craters, steep slopes and dunes are common on Mars, but the area shown in this part of the video is a special mixture: dark dunes cascade down the steep slopes to the bottom of the impact crater.
Dome dunes of the northern crater
These dark hills of sand appear to be small dunes, but in fact the average thickness of each of them is about 88 meters, which is about four times more than similar formations on Earth.
As in the first part of the video, it can be easily established that the wind is mainly blowing south.
Ancient ravines of the Great Northern Plain
Before you are the ravines of an unnamed 6-kilometer crater in the Great Northern Plain of Mars, west of the Elysian volcano.
Specific sharp ledges indicate that the crater was formed on the ground where reserves of water ice were hidden under the surface. It is noteworthy that this region, according to numerous data, in the distant past was covered by the ocean.
All images were taken from an altitude of ~ 252-297 kilometers above the surface.
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The article is written and prepared by our foreign editors from different countries around the world – material edited and published by Ordo News staff in our US newsroom press.