Strange rock formation on mars?

Does this look weird? What is your take on this rock? can anyone say how big it is?








hirise.lpl.arizona.edu...
JP2 DOWNLOAD
Grayscale: map-projected (1219.8 MB)

Looks like dirt is mounded up around the bottom. Reminds me of an uneven obelisk. I can't tell how big it is, if it's man-sized it seems like a post stuck in the ground, with dirt bunched up to help support it. Could be much, much larger though...

If you can get a date and time of when the photo was taken and its rough coordinates on Mars, you'd be able to calculate its height based on its shadow.
Of course, you'd also need a scale reference as well... For that, you'd need to know what 1cm3 of the image is in meters et c.

If NASA provides that information, then it would be quite easy to figure out its dimensions.

Edit to add;
All the information you need is on the link;

Acquisition date: 03 January 2008
Local Mars time: 2:45 PM
Latitude (centered): -53.113° Longitude (East): 125.439°
Original image scale range: 25.0 cm/pixel (with 1 x 1 binning) so objects ~75 cm across are resolved
Map projected scale: 25 cm/pixel and North is up

Additional;
www.gislounge.com...
For information on how to calculate its height with the above information.

Isn't that the "monolith" on Phobos, one of the moons of Mars?

It is an odd formation, to be sure... if not artificial, then a really interesting geologic formation that doesn't make much sense in space...with no "weathering."

ETA: Oh it IS on Mars... then weathering isn't weird... but compare that shot to the pillar on Phobos and see if it isn't almost an exact match.


EETA: Nope that IS on Phobos!! Same shape and irregularities and even the same shadow.

a reply to: Baddogma

It does look a little like the Phobos monolith, but if it is a detail from the image the OP has linked, than it is not on Phobos, but on Mars.

One explanation could be a piece of ejecta thrown by a meteorite impact.

originally posted by: Baddogma
Isn't that the "monolith" on Phobos, one of the moons of Mars?

It is an odd formation, to be sure... if not artificial, then a really interesting geologic formation that doesn't make much sense in space...with no "weathering."

ETA: Oh it IS on Mars... then weathering isn't weird... but compare that shot to the pillar on Phobos and see if it isn't almost an exact match.

EETA: Nope that IS on Phobos!! Same shape and irregularities and even the same shadow.

That is a Mars picture.

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

The 1st and 2nd (black and white) photograph is what came up when googling "Phobos Monolith." I guess the sites are wrong and it's really on Mars, which isn't surprising... but if they are separate pics of two different features than the match is... exact!

Just likely mislabeled images ... which is SO unusual on the internet (sarcasm).

ETA and after checking several such sites that include Newspapers, sure enough, they've confused this image with the Phobos monolith. So this image is indeed on Mars... and likely a natural butte, mesa or volcanic vent weathered out of softer rock. Cool none the less.

that is the flag for hole 9 I think....

seriously its a quite an impressive shadow though

originally posted by: Sovaka
If you can get a date and time of when the photo was taken and its rough coordinates on Mars, you'd be able to calculate its height based on its shadow.

It's easier than that, as they have the "solar incidence angle", the Sun was 22º above the horizon.

Edit: if my calculations are correct, that rock is 2.75 metres wide and 2.4 metres high.

a reply to: ArMaP

if my calculations are correct, that rock is 2.75 metres wide and 2.4 metres high.

Stobelisk?

THAT is where my old freezer went!!



j/k of course.

Very interesting looking.

Are there any other rocks looking even vaguely like it?

a reply to: ArMaP

Hmm not so sure about that...

According to the information, its 25cm per pixel.
I am not going to download the full 1.3Gb image to actually measure the bugger.
Perhaps the OP can and then do a pixel count of its width and length.

Looking at that thing . I was asking myself if the surrounding dirt or sand had to be more crater like?
If it was something that came down from space I would think the rock would be more crumbled then it supposed to be right now .

So I think that it has to be something from another impact ?

Well spotted, that's a very interesting rock!

Given the stated image resolution of 25.0 cm/pixel, and a top-down view, this rock measures about 5 by 5 meteres.

Here it is at the original image resolution:



There are lots of similarly-sized and similarly-shaped rocks scattered around that area, so I'd go with this being a natural rock, just more rectangular than others.

originally posted by: Sovaka
a reply to: ArMaP
I am not going to download the full 1.3Gb image to actually measure the bugger.

You don't have to, as they have included a software to view the huge JP2 files: HiView. That's what I used to take that 1:1 resolution screenshot.

Video tutorial on using HiView: www.youtube.com...


The Sun was low above the horizon, hence the long shadow. However, I'd like for someone to do the calculations and tell us the height estimate

Intriguing rectangular rock. Good find

originally posted by: Sovaka
Hmm not so sure about that...

I am (now).

According to the information, its 25cm per pixel.
I am not going to download the full 1.3Gb image to actually measure the bugger.
Perhaps the OP can and then do a pixel count of its width and length.

I didn't download the 1.3Gb JPEG2000 image, but I downloaded the 20 IMG files (at 70.8Mb each) so I could use the images in ISIS (Integrated software for imagers and spectrometers), the (free) software they use to process the images, as one of the programs of the ISIS suite has a toll for measuring the images. It was from that program that I got these screenshots.








As those are the original images sent by the spacecraft they were not processed, that's why they look worse than the JPEG2000 image and why there wasn't the possibility of getting the measurements in metres, only in pixels.

But, at 25 cm (0.25 metres) per pixel, the values in pixels in the six images above can be converted to 3.55 metres, 3.52 metres, 3.24 metres and 3.52 metres for the rock and 8.01 metres and 8.47 metres for the shadow.

Using the "Solar incidence angle" on the image page (68°, with the Sun about 22° above the horizon) we can get a height of 8.01*tan(22º)=3.23 metres and 8.47*tan(22º)=3.42 metres.

Looking at the photo it looks like the shadow on the left side is longer because the ground is slightly deeper on that side, with (apparently) a difference of some 19 cm.

Unless I got it wrong somewhere.

PS: of those 20 IMG files, the one that has the cubic(ish) rock is PSP_006737_1265_RED6_0.IMG.

a reply to: ArMaP

Good job

Tho I don't *feel* that the shadow calculation is correct.

a reply to: jamie6737

That looks like the Phobos monolith, its definitely odd.

originally posted by: Sovaka
a reply to: ArMaP

Good job

Thanks.

Tho I don't *feel* that the shadow calculation is correct.

Well, you can do you own.