Cydonia Smoking Pyramid

Cydonia's Smoking Pyramid:

groups.msn.com...

Bob...

Volcano?

Is that all you have to say about it? No information other than that photo? heh

learn me something!

Originally posted by Lysergic
Volcano?

Is that all you have to say about it? No information other than that photo? heh

learn me something!

Volcano would be a good explanation if Mars was volcanically active, but it's not. Planet cooled and died a long time ago.

Having said that, I'm not going to offer up any better explanation nor do I see any smoke...

[edit on 18/2/06 by stumason]

uh... excuse me? someone needs to retake thier Rorschach Inkblot Test. First of all, Mars is geologically inactive, secdonly I see nothing that appears to be an ash plume

lastly these images are from the MOC back in 1998. Old news

It may be old news but there are actually three (3) images from the MOC that show this feature close up and in as much detail as possible until the MRO HiRes gets to Mars this March and starts aerobraking.

All three images here:

home.thirdage.com...

show the haziness emenating from the 'crater/hole' and flowing eastward away from it. One can also PROVE that there IS some type of vapor eminating FROM the hole by the looking closely at the RING around the hole in all three images. You will see that there are DIFFERENT parts of that UNIFORM RING around the hole bright and different parts diffuse in different parts of the ring as it surrounds the hole...also in all three images the actual BOTTOM of the hole is NOT viewable from orbit. The actual floor of the crater remains obscured by the vapor, or by its depth.

There are other 'anomalies' with this feature but the Smoking part was what attracted it to me first and easily in April 1998.

It may be 'old news' but there is still no geolical explanation for the hole to be at the edge of the cliff without knocking the cliff all the heck...it isn't. The cliff extends below a 'walkway' and a 90 degree angle along it with hints of a covering on the southwest side.

In the above link the Smoking Pyramid has been rotated so that north is left in the image.

Just because some news about Mars may be old and unsolved (The Face, D n M Pyramid, Fort, Hole in the Wall, etc...) doesn't mean that ALL people agree with the official NASA/JPL party line on what is on Mars...ESPECIALLY Cydonia area.

Bob...

thats a great signature Lysergic, ware did you get it?

Yes there are 3 images, and in all images some people see "smoke".

But they do not see that the "smoke" is in the same position in all 3 images, so it is very unlikely that the "smoke" is anything in the air.

Originally posted by ArMaP
But they do not see that the "smoke" is in the same position in all 3 images, so it is very unlikely that the "smoke" is anything in the air.

I disagree that the 'smoke' is the same in all three images. I've downloaded all three and cropped to the feature on my page above and there are different areas covered and also different values, especially around the rim, around all three images.

You might also be interested to know that the THEMIS IR data shows this area to be slightly warmer than other areas around the feature. This has been shown to be true in the one Mars Express image in that spacecraft's data set archive that captures Cydonia including this feature.

Bob...

YOu obviosuly have never seen a smoke plume from a volcano. You need ot remember that the smoke comes from a POINT and disperses from there, the images of the supposed "mars" volcano are far to disperse to be an active volcano and is more likely to be fine dust coming from the mountian as the prevailing wind travels around it.

Kinda reminds of commerical i seen one time or maybe it was short cartoon.

the Mars Rover is scanning the mars landscape for life , and the scientist say , See no life on Mars --- cut away shot - shows 2 Aliens walking behind the Rover .

Originally posted by Jehosephat
...the images of the supposed "mars" volcano are far to disperse to be an active volcano and is more likely to be fine dust coming from the mountian as the prevailing wind travels around it.

Yes I HAVE seen volcano plumes and studied them from orbit as well as airal and ground based images. The vapor IS coming from a 'point' that is the hole. While the first image is the best in detail, all three show different diffuseness about the ring itslef around the hole, the mountain sides, and also the bottom of the left cliff that HAS some vapor in it in the third image but nearly NONE in the clear and distinct first image. That last alone is PROOF that whatever the process is, it IS ongoing now in real-time.

Mars IS volcanically 'dead'...according to Mainstream views. I personally don't think ALL heat is gone from the place as the surface temperature can be a blamy 70 degrees Farenheit at the surface according to the Mars Pathfinder data.

And I mention again that THEMIS IR and Mars Express PDS release of this area show this area to be warmer than surrounding terain, in quite a few place besides the Cydonia Smoking Pyramid area.

Mars is an enigmatic puzzle that even Dr. Malin had to be dragged 'kicking and screaming' to admit liquid water ON THE SURFACE of Mars...yet he has. There are fewer and fewer others who stubbornely resist this despite the evidence for it. This vapor which is on-going and currently active is another example where 'Mainstream' views are out of step with the data.

Bob...

Well last i checked they are not sure wether Mars really is geologically inactive considering the minerals they find on the surface..... I dont think there was ever a time to arrive at the conclusion that Mars is a dead planet and now is certainly not one of those times.

Stellar

Originally posted by rhw007
I disagree that the 'smoke' is the same in all three images. I've downloaded all three and cropped to the feature on my page above and there are different areas covered and also different values, especially around the rim, around all three images.

Maybe I was looking at the wrong thing.

Could you show me some pictures that show exactly where the "smoke" is?

You might also be interested to know that the THEMIS IR data shows this area to be slightly warmer than other areas around the feature. This has been shown to be true in the one Mars Express image in that spacecraft's data set archive that captures Cydonia including this feature.

"Slightly warmer" does not sound very specific.
Do you know how many degrees warmer that area is?

One thing we must remeber about the spreading of a smoke plume in Mars, independent of the fact that this one in particular is or is not a smoke plume, is the fact that Mars atmosphere is not as dense as our own, so any smoke plume would behave in a slightly (at least) different way.

Originally posted by rhw007
Mars IS volcanically 'dead'...according to Mainstream views. I personally don't think ALL heat is gone from the place as the surface temperature can be a blamy 70 degrees Farenheit at the surface according to the Mars Pathfinder data.

the MSM has nothing to do with reporting that Mars is geologically dead.. or might as well be dead comapred to earths activity. All you need to do is look at the Tharsis bulge and see.

Mars’ geological activity is nowhere near as active as earth’s. Mars appears to be a one-plate planet. This could explain why Tharsis is such a large region. On a planet with active plate tectonics the crust above an erupting hot spot would keep moving and a volcano would never grow as big as Olympus Mons

The Cydonia area is no where near the Tharsis bulge where most of the major "volcanos" now lay dorment. if there is any activitly on mars you can be assured you would first see it over by the Bulge, and not in the much lower northern part of Mars away from the bulge

[edit on 2/19/2006 by Jehosephat]

Originally posted by ArMaP

Originally posted by rhw007
I disagree that the 'smoke' is the same in all three images. I've downloaded all three and cropped to the feature on my page above and there are different areas covered and also different values, especially around the rim, around all three images.

Maybe I was looking at the wrong thing.

Could you show me some pictures that show exactly where the "smoke" is?

There was an animation link on the page I linked to above. The animation link is repeated here:

home.thirdage.com...

I don't think it is 'smoke' per se but more likely mostly wator vapor of some source and yes I do understand that actions on Mars may be different than those on Earth which is why I think the vapor FLOWS across the terrain close to the surface rather than flowing straight up and out of the hole.

The average temp differences were in the range of 20-30 deg C from the THEMIS IR data. Since I no longer have my website up I am limited to amount of data I can post for 'peer review'.

The original THEMIS data is available at the ASU PDS site as well as the PDS MOC archive for the MOC images. In the link above I gave direct links to the raw MOC data where folks can load the raw data themselves and look at the differences this vapor shows in all three images.

To date I haven't heard any SOLID geolical explanation for ALL data points surrounding this anomaly.

Bob...

Is Mars geologically dead?

I believe the jury is still out (somewhat) on this.

science.nasa.gov...

Expanding on this notion, in 1991 Vic Baker of the University of Arizona, suggested that Mars might not be geologically dead and permanently frozen. Instead, he proposed, Mars might undergo cycles, or pulses -- first heating up, releasing groundwater and forming an ocean in the north, then dissipating the ocean back into the planet's crust and re-freezing.


More recently, Jim Head and colleagues at Brown University, found evidence that is consistent with a shoreline that might indeed have existed at the inner of Parker's two proposed contacts, contact 2. Head and colleagues examined elevation data gathered by the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) on board the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) and found that the elevation at points along contact 2 were much closer to a straight line than those at contact 1. They also found that the terrain below this elevation was smoother than the terrain above it. Both of these findings are consistent with the former presence there of an ocean.

www.sciam.com...

Even through these dark years, veteran researcher William K. Hartmann held that Mars was not, in fact, geologically dead. He reasoned that some of the terrain was so fresh, so free of meteor craters, that at least some of the volcanoes were not extinct, merely dormant. It was a minority view--but no longer. New space missions have found signs not just of recent volcanism but of glaciers, liquid water and periodic climate change. Things are looking up again for the Red Planet, and Hartmann's latest book encapsulates this understanding.

...snip...

Hartmann's book is being marketed as a travel guide, but it is best thought of as an extended argument for the persistence of geologic activity. The main concession to the guidebook conceit is its region-by-region approach. Going (roughly) from the oldest terrain to the youngest, the book provides a close reading of the most scientifically and aesthetically compelling images. It shows how planetary geologists reconstruct Martian history by looking at the relationships among formations: whether a crater punctures a lava flow, say, or a sand dune covers a crater floor. The book includes a number of photographs of similar-looking formations on Earth, as well as interpretive paintings. (Hartmann is a well-known astronomical artist.)

www.space.com...

Science magazine will publish the Malin-Edgett paper in its June 30 issue. But the article was released on Thursday, two days after SPACE.com reported that scientists had found "seasonal deposits" of water from springs on the Martian surface.
That, along with other reports, triggered a flurry of broadcast and print reports around the world. The barrage of publicity in turn prompted NASA to move up by a week its scheduled June 29 press conference to counter what it called "incorrect" accounts of the discovery.

If the findings can be confirmed, "it means Mars is not geologically dead," said Wes Huntress, NASA's former space science chief and now director of the Geophysical Laboratory, Carnegie Institution of Washington.
"We knew that there's really water below the surface but we didn't know where it was," he said.

With all that being said, if Mars is geologically active it's not like we know it here on Earth (possibly only one plate as Jehosephat mentioned earlier.) Regardless i don't see any 'smoke' in the pics provided... but even if it's there, and i'm just not seeing it, i think dust is the more probable/sensible conclusion. If this was smoke from an active volcano (highly unlkely) i'd think it'd be obvious. We have no problems seeing the plumes on various moons around Jupiter so i can't see why we wouldn't notice it on Mars.

Here's a good page on the volcanism of Mars:

www.geology.sdsu.edu...

VOLCANIC FEATURES
The volcanic features on Mars are very similar in shape, but not in scale, to those found on earth, and they probably formed by similar processes. In contrast to the volcanic features found on the moon, those on Mars were generated on terrains of variable ages. Thus, volcanism has been an important process throughout Martian history. Numerous volcanic landforms can be found in the older cratered highlands and in the younger volcanic plains surrounding them. However, the most impressive volcanic landforms are associated with the extensive, hotspot-related uplifts of Tharsis and Elysium plateaus. The volcanic features described below include the giant central volcanoes, peterae, tholi, and rootless cones.

pic taken from: Here

But i did find this from October '05 that says, based on MGS data, Mars once did have plate tectonics similar to Earth... so who knows.

www.universetoday.com...

Mars Global Surveyor has been stitched together to create a planetary map of magnetism. This map shows striping, where two plates were once pushed apart by new molten lava coming up from under the surface. This new lava become magnetized in the direction of Mars magnetic field at the time. Since this magnetic field flipped several times through the planet's history, the stripes provide a record of when Mars' plates were active.

NASA scientists have discovered additional evidence that Mars once underwent plate tectonics, slow movement of the planet's crust, like the present-day Earth. A new map of Mars' magnetic field made by the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft reveals a world whose history was shaped by great crustal plates being pulled apart or smashed together.

But like i said i'm not seeing the smoke... is it just me?

I found a bit of information about "clouds" on Mars and I think what is being described as "smoke" from a volcano is actaully what are refered to as the martian equivilant of Orographic Clouds, or lenticular clouds

Air that flows over a mountain forms air waves on the leeward side of the mountain. In the back of the wave where the air rises, the air cools and forms a cloud. The air flows on through the cloud and down into the wave "valley" where the temperature rises enough to dry out the cloud droplets and clear the air. Typical for such clouds is the elongated, smooth form. The Orographic clouds are often called almond clouds or lenticular clouds, and they move very little, in spite of a often very strong wind.

Originally posted by rhw007
There was an animation link on the page I linked to above. The animation link is repeated here:

home.thirdage.com...

OK, I did not saw that. Now I now what I should have looked.

It does not look like smoke or vapour, to me it looks only like a surface smoother than the envolving terrain viewed with different the light from the Sun (I suppose) comming from different directions.

Rren, you gave many good articles about the 'question' is Mars geoligically dead or not. It is my belief right now is that, according to NASA, it is. There is no CURRENT vulcanism, geothermal vapor, liquid water (Malin's and others' viewpoints being changed notwithstanding) or life on Mars according to NASA's Press Release Offices and accepted as undisputed FACT by them. There are many scientists who have differing opinions and going through 'peer review' there is still debate about the dark streaks being 'dust slides' by many scientists despite Malin n MSSS, among others, who state that the dark streaks are liquid water/brine bursts that the MGSMOC images clearly show. Again I refer to the 'official' position of NASA since it is THAT opinion which must state something to be true before many others will acept something as true on Mars...especially Cydonia. I am of the opinion that certain features, especially in Cydonia are of artificial origin...most others disagree and won't change their mind until NASA says such is so.

ArMap it isn't just 'talus'...which if you know the geological term is small rocks at the bottom of cliffs here on Earth. There is no 'talus/vapor' on the North side of the cliff in the first two images, yet there is in the third. The 'talus/vapor' changes, especially around the rim of the hole, in all 3 images. And if it was talus and not vapor, then the hole should be full to overflowing, yet the hole is dark and deep and unvisible in all 3 images. The ESA Mars Express of this feature, which is at their PDS release site, is mostly in the infrared range and 'hot' spots or white and colder spots dark. This hole is very very white in that image along with south side of the pyramid shape while the cliffs are very dark.

Jehosephat would such an 'Orographic Cloud' emenate directly from a single source such as the hole? As I mentioned above the vapor is NOT on the North(left) side of the cliff in the first image but is in others. To me this indicates an ongoing and currently active process.

To me the first image is the best view of the feature and is more orthographically correct. The 90 degree angle near the hole, the hole being beveled against the side of the Pyramid, the uniform RING around the hole, a level ledge/road leading along the left side to a 60 foot hole in the side of the Pyramid/Mount all suggest artificiallity to me. However I remain open to the vapor being a natural 'hot spot' on the Cydonia plain. But there is no doubt in my mind that there are differences between all three images, especially around the RIM of the hole, along with the changes is vapor thickness and area covered.

In the end, maybe the MRO HiRes will share more insight into this feature, or like Malin admits; it might take boots on the ground and a pick-axe swung by some human.

Bob...

These mars pics are always the most interesting to me. There is very clearly some sort of vapor emitting from the surface. What it is is really anyones guess. NASA admitted the flow of liquid water on the surface of mars, so it seems like just a matter of time before more and more is discovered.