Mars - Water

[popster1]

The article states:

Radar echoes received by the spacecraft indicated radio waves pass through the aprons and reflect off a deeper surface below without significant loss in strength.

It seems like quite a leap from that to buried glaciers. Would not empty caverns produce a similar response?

[Osmosis]

I asked a geophysicist friend about the Mars GPR discovery of possible ice. If the ice is very clean, the GPR would respond as if there was a void, since clear ice is a pretty good insulator. It the ice is dirty, it would be detected.

So, NASA, has to send up a robot Bobcat, to dig some up!

[hyper.real]

If an excess of protons as measured by an orbiting spacecraft is the prime evidence for H2O, then the inference to buried glaciers from radar reflection is neither difficult nor surprising, and quite possibly completely incorrect.

Wal Thornhill has discussed radar imaging of Venus in a context of surface geology.

Giga-amp electrical discharges to a planetary surface would entail substantial subsurface currents, possibly considerable resultant heat, producing glassification on a large scale, and changes in the chemistry, the crystal microstructure, and the electrical properties of the rocks, which must also affect the way they reflect radar signals.

As usual, wishful thinking precludes attention being given to alternative explanations.

If there is water on Mars... bring it back and have someone drink it.

[Influx]

http://www.msss.com/moc_gallery/m07_m12 ... 02736.html

http://www.msss.com/moc_gallery/e07_e12 ... 01928.html

http://www.msss.com/moc_gallery/m07_m12 ... 02507.html

Okay, so all these images look to my untrained eye to be like glaciers melting, complete with icebergs breaking of the shore line and floating away.

[Influx]

Is everyone stumped? I guess we need better pictures of that area. But going by what we have now, well it looks awfully like melting glaciers to me. I know this goes against all the accepted beliefs about mars, but still..., are my eyes deceiving me? Or do I have a severe case of patternicity?

[bdw000]

I am no expert.

My understanding is that the white stuff on the surface of Mars is dry ice: frozen CO2.

That's why the recent probe had to scrape under the dirt to look for what might be WATER ice.

Anyone please correct me if this is wrong.

[Solar]

The thread "Guessing this is not actually water..." might be of assistance as well as "The Search for Water on Mars Continues".

[Influx]

Yes, thanks for the help, but did anyone notice the white flecks seemingly floating in mid air? Icebergs? Or the barely seen shoreline in the "dry ice"?

[rob.b]

Hi! On 2DEC 1999 I sent a letter to New Scientist Mag predicting the existence of sub surface water on Mars by reference to Velikovskian theory. It may have been a coincidence but the Nasa mission was adapted to look for sub surface water soon afterwards. At that time the great talking point was the absence of a Martian atmosphere. Part of what I wrote back then might stimulate a few thoughts: "Mars did not only lose its atmosphere, it also lost its water and its magnetic field, which points to large scale trauma. A far simpler answer to the problem is that Mars was disturbed in its orbit by a rogue element in the Solar System. A prime contender would be Venus, whose retrograde orbit and remanent heat indicate an unusual origin. If then a destabilised Mars passed extremely close to its near neighbour the Earth, twice its size and ten times its mass, with three times its gravitational pull, what would happen? Just as our tiny Moon lifts Earth's oceans as it passes overhead, the Earth would attract everything not nailed down on Mars as it passed by us. If the pass was close enough we would capture Mars' atmosphere, its surface water, and, if the magnetospheres contacted we might even neutralise its magnetic charge. The result would be a world deluge which raised sea levels to unprecedented heights (water now covers over 70% of our planet). The exciting thing about such a magnetic mugging would be that along with the Martian biosphere we would also have got any flora and fauna it had. This might explain some fossil animals whose construction seems to contravene the laws of physics here on Earth, but would be far more feasible if gravity was three times less: I think of flying reptiles incapable of ground take off, animals with impossibly long unsupported necks and saurians whose sheer body weight and blood pressure would cause support problems. The fact that the remains of these creatures are apparently everywhere covered with red clay supposedly of extra terrestrial origin is only one more piece of a fascinating puzzle. The good news for explorers of the red planet is that all Mars water which was below ground at the time of the trauma should still be there though frozen solid." Since that time I have come to believe that this collision of worlds may also help explain the great onset of ice: and believe me, 45,000,000 sq. kilometres of ice up to 1.9 miles thick covering 30% of world's land area, colossal pluvial lakes and the great deposition of salt take some explaining. If Earth stole the Martian surface water and Mars then travelled for some time on a parallel course with Earth BUT that course was between the Earth and the Sun and eclipsed the Earth from sunlight, you have an explanantion both for the great deluge and the great ice sheets that followed. Just a thought!

[Osmosis]

Welcome, rob.b

Wow, where have you been hiding? A big challenge will be to analyze the red soil on Mars, so it can be compared to the red clay here, on Earth. Geochemists, wake up!

[rob.b]

Re my previous comment. Whether or not these structures are any kind of ice, water, CO2, etc. or just geological the more interesting question is how were they formed. If the scenario was indeed two planetospheres coming together and then pulling apart a wide range of unusual conditions and colossal stresses would pertain. Massive electro-magnetic attraction varying from extreme gravity to no gravity, possible electrical discharges and pole reversals, possible extreme heat, sudden removal of biosphere followed by sudden freezing of what was still oozing out of the ground. It might be an idea to view these structures as a snapshot of the ultimate effect on the Martian geology as the two bodies finally separated. On the other hand it might be the result of something quite ordinary that happens from time to time on large red planets of a certain constitution and at a given distance from the sun.

[moses]

Hi Rob B.
Your thoughts are indeed similar to mine, as expressed on this forum. I consider
it likely that the Pacific edge American mountain ranges were formed when Mars
came close to the Earth. I agree with the red dust and the water and the dinos,
but I feel that Earth and Mars were once pretty close together in the Saturn System
of planets. And a plasma bridge connected the planets allowing tranfer of material
between the planets. Thus dinosaurs transfered from Mars to Earth long ago, too.

If you are interested you could look at my postings - easy enough to do. Or else I
could say more.
Mo

[rob.b]

Great! Will do that and get back to you. Rob.b.

[rob.b]

Hi mo, I read most of your postings that I could find on this subject. Very intriguing. Re the Andes I think it is generally agreed that they were uplifted in historical times. The Tihuanaco remains would tend to confirm not just uplift, but sudden uplift. Re the coincident shapes of continental coastlines which was I think another string of this debate, I read somewhere that the mountains, coastlines and the great Rift geological fault in Africa could all be explained by a massive twisting moment exerted upon the Earth by some external force acting asymmetrically on the planet. Perhaps a Mars pass. Re the fascinating speculation upon the physiology of flying dinosaurs, a Mars origin would make all the high end modifications even more relevant. Personally I find the popularly expressed idea that these pterosaurs lived on cliffs, never landed on the ground and only took their food on the wing only slightly less absurd than the hang-glider theory of giant ungainly carrion eaters standing around a carcass waiting for a fresh breeze to lift their bloated-with-food bodies up into the air. Similarly absurd is the explanation of the large brontosaur type animals living in water to support their grotesque weight.Given the type of efficient predators around in water at the time I think they would have been eaten alive below the water line. Ever seen sharks around a dead whale? Whilst we are on the subject has anybody else wondered how sabre toothed tigers managed to eat with those two great orthodontic fenders preventing them passing anything large into their mouths? Could they actually have been truffle diggers and fruit eaters? Or were they, like many of their contemporaries ( I think of the Giant Elk with its neck breaking antlers, Mastodon with its tons of tusk) short-lived mutants resulting from massive doses of either electro magnetic, electrical, heat or cosmic radiation? So many mysteries ... so little time.

[moses]

Mars-Earth discussion moved to :
http://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/forum/phpB ... =10&t=1402
Mo