Burns cliff

Guys,

I have seen little of what I would suggest was flow from frost. The deep holes and "Mud Banks" strongly suggest flows from under the rock slabs.

From memory I would suggest the flow event sites occur at about the same depth down the crater wall of the so I suspect there is a underground water component acting here.

Flow event sites were seen near the bottom of the initial entry pathway, on the way to Wopmay, at Wopmay and now at Burns Cliff so they are spread around the crater and as I said before, at about the same depth.

Then there are the flow sites on the crater lip.

The totality of the photos would suggest there is recent underground water action at Endurance. Recent enough to leave holes which the sand has not yet filled in.

Re: 137

I don't think the mud flow from UNDER the rock slab which formed the "Mud Banks / Flats" in this photo was produced by a cup of water. More like quite a few litres.

Horton,

Would you please do a left and right colour series of this flow event site? I'm especially interested in the hole wall detail visible inside the right hole. There are 3 right and 3 left shots. The are from Sol 117

Thanks in advance

Horton,

Here is what I'm talking about. The structures lining the inside wall of the right flow hole are not sized to be BBs (they are bigger) yet look similiar in size and shape.

Down there it is sometimes warm, wet and protected from a lot of direct UV. Now what would like to those conditions?

Then there are the very obivious flow features which suggest the main flow here is upward and outward. Just look at the flow patterns surrounding the imbedded BBs in the bank to the right.

Thanks for the challenge, microkid.

3D L2/L5/L6 R1 image:

Warning:2.7 MB link:

I wouldn't bother downloading this image.

There was no R1 filter -- essential in producing synthetic color Right images -- so, I tried something new: I colorized the R2 image to approximately match the Left image.

The left image was created with (R,G,B)=(1.37(L2),L5, 0.86(L6)) to lighten the darker areas ( as you did in the B&W version) -- but in truth I don't see any added value to the color 3D image.

You can't get 10 pounds of, er, fertilizer out of a 5 pound bag.

4x3 pan of Burns Cliff:

Warning:4.6 MB link:

Guys, please download this one only if you want to seriously study the cliff.

I sure hope those rocks are glued on good and tight...

I wonder how much of a jolt it would take to loosen them?

I will redo when the partial frame is resent -- or keep on expanding the pan if more are sent.

Man, oh, man, Horton, your images incredible. The Burns Cliff panorama is so incredibly detailed (any chance of a stereo pair?). And I can't get over how well you colourized the one photo in reply 145. Amazing!

Hey, MicroKid, isn't that muddy flow going into the hole? The "flow margin" seems to partially drape over some spherules (left arrow) and is on the verge of dripping into the hole (right arrow). I think the slight tails behind the spherules indicate wind direction and not flow direction, in my humble opinion.

Cross-eyed stereo

Parallel stereo

MicroKid,

Like you pointed out before, there is a lot of fluid flow evidence here on the south outside slope of Endurance. The fluid did not travel far on the surface, but it did enough work to leave evidence of its existence - not too long ago. (The evidence is multi facetted - troughs at the down hill side of rocks, mud covered "berries", small collapsed depressions, rills, etc.)

It is real hard to get feeling for age of surfaces as there seems to be very slow dust accumulation. My view of Martian dust has changed. Dust at Meridiani and Gusev is way orders less in magnitude than on earth – global dust storms may bring more moisture than dust...

Horton, the Burns Cliff stitch is fantastic!

It makes me want to go out and buy another monitor just so I can enjoy it across three!

Is there any way to make the left image to go with it?, for the most awsome cross eyed stereo image ever made?

You look at images with 2 monitors, fossils?

Does the water come out? does water go in?
Both?
Do the fines run down the sides? why don't they fill up the crater? They dont even make small piles.
This is from Eagle, sorry but as an example.

Is this whole area, a big chunck of swiss cheese?
is all the loose soil funneling down? Is this why the craters don't fill up more?

Yes, well actually I already use three. Two 19" 1280x1024 .294 LCDs on one system where you can drag windows across both (it would be nice to add a third here). And one 1400x1050 LCD on another system where I type this kind of stuff. LCDs are really good compared to the old giant monitors. It seems that monitor quality is a factor in what can be discerned in some of the MER photos. Comparing images where you can see the 1024x1024 full image pixel for pixel on a bright color adjusted screen is great!

Guys,

In the above image of the two holes I really doubt there is any net inflow rather a net outflow as the hole pair is right on the edge of the crater rim. The ground falls away to the right and left as can be seen in the moasic. There is no high ground to funnel frost / snow into the holes.

As I see it there is a slow welling up of a mud / salt mixture which resulted in the into the crater flow channels going right and the left running flow features. Then as the flow receeds back under ground there is left behind the remains such as the hanging lips.

When you take the flow patterns around the BBs on the right side of the right hole with the right running flow channels running into the crater it becomes very difficult to see this site as anything but a net outflow event.

And then there are at least 2 dozen other sites with similiar features.

Yes, area is flat -- at the rim of the crater.

Er, I posted a 3D 1x3 panorama of the area of reply 148 a long time ago -- and reposted it in reply 52 of this topic.

Perhaps it's time to do a color version?

Another L2/L5/L6 - R1 view of the same hole.

Amazing that if we can get a net outward (more outward than inward) fluid flow event site right on the top lip of Endurance crater is it so hard to believe there is flow from under rock slabs inside the crater?

Take a look at the dust buildup patterns on the BBs sitting on the rock slab surfaces. Are they cleaner on the sides facing the holes? Wonder if they get shinny when the fluid flows? Hey who was that guy who spotted shinny BBs right next to a ratted rock on the crater rim?

Then you just gotta wonder at that caused the interesting structures lining the inside of the flow holes...................

3x10 139 degree panorama of Burns Cliff:

Small (0.8 MB)

Large (12.6 MB)

Original (31.5 MB)

Please download the larger versions only if you wish to study the cliff at greater than 100% magnification.

Is that all there is? Is that all there is? If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing...

Bee-ahh-you-ti-fulll! Let's see NASA outdo that!

Wow.

One thing that bugs me about a lack of equipment on the rover is why they do not have anything that can measure water ina a soil sample directly. There has go to be SOME wtaer in there, why did they not include any equipment to measure it? For example, take a soil sample, bake out the water, and measure how much water comes out of it. We are trying to "follow the water" aren't we? We have all this conjecture about possible muddy flow, a lot of that could be settled if we could just measure the water content in the soil and/or rock.

R Lewis:

The whole focus of the MER missions is "follow the water". So it would be odd indeed if there was no instrument to detect its presence. And there is, miniTES can measure the water content of soil directly using thermal IR spectroscopy.

Wanting water to be present at the surface of the crater walls does not mean that there is (or was). As with all other examples previously posted I see no evidence of a source of water (point or line discharge), water flow morphology (rills, leveels, channel), sediment transport (fans, wash) or drainage network (dendritic or centripetal). We have got to go for what is there, not what we want to be there.

Cheers

Jon