Opportunity Rover: "The Spirit of St. Louis Crater"

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7 years 8 months ago #5982 by Todd

Opportunity Rover: "The Spirit of St. Louis Crater" was created by Todd

This is a two frame composite of the elongated, angular crater named "The Spirit of St. Louis," taken by the Opportunity Rover's pan-cam on sol 3973. It's an unusually shallow crater, if that's what this truly is, I'm skeptical. The rock spire within it looks as if, at one time, it might have been stacked intentionally. The image below was processed from the PDS raw .img files.

Below, another two frame composite made from Opportunity Rover's pan-cam images, this time taken on sol 4011 showing a close up of the crater spire. The image below was also processed from the PDS raw .img files.

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7 years 8 months ago #5985 by Badsneaker

Replied by Badsneaker on topic Opportunity Rover: "The Spirit of St. Louis Crater"

Todd, I agree. That stack of rocks is highly out of place and I don't believe they just turned up there by coincidence. There are no others, that I can detect, of that size laying on the surface anywhere around it

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7 years 8 months ago #5990 by Todd

Replied by Todd on topic Opportunity Rover: "The Spirit of St. Louis Crater"

Yes, they seem to be sitting upright vertically, which is odd, making me think it could've been some kind of monument or the remnants of a collapsed structure or wall. I've never seen a crater mound look quite like that.

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7 years 8 months ago - 7 years 8 months ago #5991 by ??

Replied by ?? on topic Opportunity Rover: "The Spirit of St. Louis Crater"

It looks to me like something tall and made out of stone toppled and scattered-shattered-splattered to the left. What it was and how it got there to begin with are hard for me to understand as natural geologic processes.

Could a tsunami have flowed over it from right to left? How natural is that? Could strong winds have blown from the same direction and blown it over? How strong would those winds have to be to do that? Mars does have dust-devils so it is easy for me to imagine tornadoes.

Last edit: 7 years 8 months ago by ??. Reason: Added text. Reset font.

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7 years 8 months ago #5992 by Todd

Replied by Todd on topic Opportunity Rover: "The Spirit of St. Louis Crater"

Those are all good questions and I wish I had an answer. I suppose it depends when it was created and what the conditions on Mars were over the duration, assuming it's a natural formation. I think if it was naturally created, a large ammount of water could be the culprit, but too much water over time would smooth out and flatten that formation.
quest.nasa.gov/aero/planetary/mars.html

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