Weird Martian soil properties

Hi all,

I was looking at the color photos from the Spirit martian rover, and this one
caught my attention:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/mars/m...lorimage4.html

It's a photo of part of the surface disturbed during landing, as the
airbags impacted the soil. The spot of impact looks very strange. It
looks like some sort of silt that was peeled yet still sticks to itself.
Part of it appears to have exposed a large rock underneath, as if the
soil above was pulled away in one large chunk. It all seems like some
sort of sticky powder.

Maybe the folks at NASA should target the soil disturbed by the lander
as one of the first stops for the rover...

Kevin H wrote:
Hi all,

I was looking at the color photos from the Spirit martian rover, and this one
caught my attention:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/mars/m...lorimage4.html

It's a photo of part of the surface disturbed during landing, as the
airbags impacted the soil. The spot of impact looks very strange. It
looks like some sort of silt that was peeled yet still sticks to itself.
Part of it appears to have exposed a large rock underneath, as if the
soil above was pulled away in one large chunk. It all seems like some
sort of sticky powder.

Warning: speculation follows:
Not a martiologist, but dirt which, after being peeled back sticks to
itself without deforming is fairly typical of loess. On earth, this is
usually a property of being wet. Perhaps there is some similar static
attraction, or ' instant freeze drying' of soil on Mars. We'll need to
see just how dry this stuff is, no?

--
Geo Communications Services -- www.geocommunications.net
Jo Schaper's Missouri World -- http://www.missouriworld.net

"Kevin H" wrote in message
om...
It
looks like some sort of silt that was peeled yet still sticks to itself.
Part of it appears to have exposed a large rock underneath, as if the
soil above was pulled away in one large chunk. It all seems like some
sort of sticky powder.


Sounds like the gravy an old girlfriend of mine used to make.

"Kevin H" wrote in message
om...
Hi all,

I was looking at the color photos from the Spirit martian rover, and this
one
caught my attention:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/mars/m...lorimage4.html

It's a photo of part of the surface disturbed during landing, as the
airbags impacted the soil. The spot of impact looks very strange. It
looks like some sort of silt that was peeled yet still sticks to itself.
Part of it appears to have exposed a large rock underneath, as if the
soil above was pulled away in one large chunk. It all seems like some
sort of sticky powder.

Maybe the folks at NASA should target the soil disturbed by the lander
as one of the first stops for the rover...

Conjecture is far and wide on this one, but, I think the photo is too fuzzy
to make any assumptions at this time. I don't think its due to water, or
someone's gravy (although, it looks like the stuff that I still make, and
I'm no ones girlfriend. LOL)

It might just be the angle or something, to early to tell.

TL

And I had a look at this one.

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/galle...a/PIA04996.jpg

The text added says:

quote
Windtails Show Direction of Martian Winds
This image highlights streaks or tails of loose debris in the martian
soil, which reveal the direction of prevailing winds. The picture was taken
by the panoramic camera on Mars Exploration Rover Spirit.

unquote

The roch in which shadow the sand should have fallen to rest is partly
situated on top of the drift, or there is not really an obvious lee for the
drift! Or do I get the meaning 'tail' wrong ... the small dune should be a
transverse dune, perpendicular to line of sight, right?

Carsten

"Kevin H" wrote in message
om...
Hi all,

I was looking at the color photos from the Spirit martian rover, and this
one
caught my attention:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/mars/m...lorimage4.html

It's a photo of part of the surface disturbed during landing, as the
airbags impacted the soil. The spot of impact looks very strange. It
looks like some sort of silt that was peeled yet still sticks to itself.
Part of it appears to have exposed a large rock underneath, as if the
soil above was pulled away in one large chunk. It all seems like some
sort of sticky powder.

Maybe the folks at NASA should target the soil disturbed by the lander
as one of the first stops for the rover...

From what I know about the Martian regolith (basically gleaned from reading
too many KSR and Ben Bova novels) it is mainly composed of micrometer
diameter particles called "fines". I would imagine a similar earthbound
equivalent to be fine flour. To me, the image looks exactly like what you
would see if you had 2 layers of fines (or flour - one a dark grey, the
other red) and dragged something heavy that was moving dynamically over the
surface.
If this image had its origins in some similarly inhospitible place on earth,
would we be so intrigued by it?

Just a thought...

Plankmeister.

The Plankmeister wrote:
From what I know about the Martian regolith (basically gleaned from reading
too many KSR and Ben Bova novels) it is mainly composed of micrometer
diameter particles called "fines". I would imagine a similar earthbound
equivalent to be fine flour. To me, the image looks exactly like what you
would see if you had 2 layers of fines (or flour - one a dark grey, the
other red) and dragged something heavy that was moving dynamically over the
surface.
If this image had its origins in some similarly inhospitible place on earth,
would we be so intrigued by it?

Loess is usually defined as 'rock flour'.



--
Geo Communications Services -- www.geocommunications.net
Jo Schaper's Missouri World -- http://www.missouriworld.net

Warning: speculation follows:
Not a martiologist, but dirt which, after being peeled back sticks to
itself without deforming is fairly typical of loess. On earth, this is
usually a property of being wet. Perhaps there is some similar static
attraction, or ' instant freeze drying' of soil on Mars.

could it be raised magnetic properties in the sediment - due to aparently a
general high proportion of Fe ?

The red coloring seems to be somewhat surficial

We'll need to
see just how dry this stuff is, no?

Carsten

It's mud... but not as we know it:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...andatruepuzzle

"Paul Neave" wrote:

It's mud... but not as we know it:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp.../chitrib_ts/20
040107/ts_chicagotrib/nasagetsgoodlookatmarssoilandatruepuzz
le

Pooh. It's Beagle 2.

Or maybe it's a fulgurite.