Mars Disc Shaped Anomaly Near the South Pole

[rdunk]

I am posting an anomaly I found near the South Pole of Mars. I have posted it at other places, so some of you may have seen it prior. This anomaly is very different, and it is very obvious, in its setting. We cannot see all of it in the CTX photo, as about half of it is covered by some unusual thatchy looking "stuff". (Where would "thatch" come from on Mars??)

The part of the anomaly that we can see has a rounded disc shape appearance, with what look like "broken triangular pieces" making up the center surface area.

Additionally, there is some type of solid white structure piece that also can be seen sitting on the center surface.

Whatever this anomaly might be, it does make for very interesting speculation, and discussion. I know of no way to estimate size of the anomaly - do any of you know how to make a size estimate?

I will post a link to the full CTX photo.

I will post an unmagnified descriptive screenshot of the top of the CTX photo, to help everyone find the anomaly, in the pic taken at altitude.

I will post a magnified screenshot, that clearly shows the anomaly.

Link:   http://viewer.mars.asu.edu/planetview/inst/ctx/P11_005338_0878_XI_87S084W#start

[Amaterasu]

Wow.  That IS odd.  Hate to say it but it rather reminded Me of the Baltic Sea object - vaguely...

[rdunk]

Amaterasu, that is funny, because, as I was preparing this post, I too thought about the same Baltic Sea anomaly. The similarity of the two is..........they both are very odd looking pieces, in not so odd looking places. And both raise a lot of questions, with few answers so far.

At least the Baltic Sea anomaly has a chance of being researched to a factual answer. This Mars anomaly is what it is, and it will likely remain a mystery, for a very long time!

Thanks for the comment!

[Amaterasu]

Fine minds think alike...?  [grin]  Most welcome.

[starwarp2000]

Most interesting, rdunk!

At first i thought that the anomaly could be explained by maybe, frost deposition (Which occurs every Martian Winter), but on closer examination, i now see something different.
The bottom picture in the OP, definitely shows 3 dimensional form to the bottom half of the circle. Almost as if an object has impacted the area.
Or maybe a protective barrier (semi-circular) built to protect the site.

Definitively deserves closer examination!

Thanks for bringing it to our attention! 

[thorfourwinds]

Greetings:

And we thought there were similarities here, of all places, right in front of our faces:



tfw

[deuem]

Hi rdunk,

On your close up, if you follow from the impact out towards 10:30 on the clock you see a darker shade of surface. About one diameter away from the crater is what I would un-scientifically call a splat. The surface shows me a spray pattern. You can not see this in the black. I did not publish this photo because of the jpg compression. If there is anyway you could start again and do it all in png or tiff, it will leave out the compression garbage. I would like to make sure I am checking the photo and not the garbage from jpg. As you look at it, you will see there is a dark area on the ground. Maybe you can also play with the light and bring up the black to see what is really there.

In the impact crater, I could not find anything that stands out. But I reserve any remarks for a png photo with no compression groups every 8 sq pixel groups. My best suggestion for you, is to stay away from any jpg photos of Mars. The product has been manipulated by the compression. If you did the screen grab and your grab tool only gives you jpg, get another one like snapshot or grab.

Deuem

[ArMaP]

I remember that one.

As I said in one of those places where you posted it before, it looks like a pingo.

The people from HiRISE say it's a crater, here, and I think it could be, a crater made by an object that hit Mars at an angle and that created a slanted crater, with the crater material accumulated in the direction the object was travelling.

[ArMaP]

But I reserve any remarks for a png photo with no compression groups every 8 sq pixel groups.

The link that rdunk posted has several image formats available for download, but I think none of those are full size versions of the original image.

I will try to get the original.

[rdunk]

The bottom picture in the OP, definitely shows 3 dimensional form to the bottom half of the circle. Almost as if an object has impacted the area.
Or maybe a protective barrier (semi-circular) built to protect the site.

Definitively deserves closer examination!


starwarp, it is good to hear that you are seeing just what I see. When i first found this last year, I got pretty excited, because of what I saw in it. In my view, there is no way this could be a natural "thing", but rather absolutely an "intelligent designed" object.

There is no way to say for sure what the object is, partly because it is covered with the "thatchy looking stuff", which, for some reason, is prevalent right here in this area. It actually looks "applied" to me, but then, what do I know about that.

The part of the anomaly that we can see is "perfectly rounded", but we cannot see whether it makes a complete circle. One thing we can see, if it is "unmagnified" a bit, is an elongated "raised hump" in the "thatch", stretching above from the disc. No way to know for sure whether that is related to the anomaly or not, but we could guess that it might be.

For an only slightly different look at this anomaly, I am posting a HIRISE photo that I believe ArMaP provided to me in a reply to my post on this at ATS. So, it is a very similar pic, with a different orbital camera,. For me, this pic does provide additional confirmation of the anomaly. -- HIRISE: ESP_014436_0920_RED

[rdunk]

deuem, here is a png screenshot I "captured" in August of last year on this anomaly. Back then, all  of my screenshots were png, because I didn't know any better. To me the photo views are about the same as with jpg, and of course jpg consumes much less memory.

But since you asked for it, I will see if this png can be posted here. (with its size)

[deuem]

deuem, here is a png screenshot I "captured" in August of last year on this anomaly. Back then, all  of my screenshots were png, because I didn't know any better. To me the photo views are about the same as with jpg, and of course jpg consumes much less memory.

But since you asked for it, I will see if this png can be posted here. (with its size)

Thanks, I grabbed it and will take a look. The size I see is just 100kb larger. It is just a small amount to use for the better format. If you want you can store all your photos compressed with zip or rar to save disk space. I do this with all finished work. One at a time or a folder of work.
I will get back on this one,
Deuem

[deuem]

 Looking at the new photo added nothing for my program.

When I looked at it as presented, I notice that there are compression rings all around the base. Steeper on the lower side. I see a flat top rim around most of what is left on the top. As silly as this sounds, it appears to me that this is not an impact crater but something rising from the surface and then the weak side to 10:30 let go and splashed the line we see. If the white area is ice of some nature it at one time blew out and then dropped to what we see. Sort of like cracks in a dome inverted down. I also can not find any material ejected to the 4:30 side of the print.

On those compression rings, if something that big hit it coming from 10:30 then why are they almost in balance all the way around and not 90% to the bottom? The top should be almost free of these rings!

Deuem

[rdunk]

I remember that one.

As I said in one of those places where you posted it before, it looks like a pingo.

The people from HiRISE say it's a crater, here, and I think it could be, a crater made by an object that hit Mars at an angle and that created a slanted crater, with the crater material accumulated in the direction the object was travelling.

Hi Armap! Yes I was sure you would remember this anomaly. I now have even posted the HIRISE pic that you previously provided in that discussion.

For me, neither of the pics (HIRISE or CTX) show what has any resemblance to a crater, nor a "pingo". But then, that is just my opinion!

What I would really like to do, is to see under that "thatchy stuff". There may be other stuff under there we need to see!

[rdunk]

Deuem said, "When I looked at it as presented, I notice that there are compression rings all around the base. Steeper on the lower side. I see a flat top rim around most of what is left on the top. As silly as this sounds, it appears to me that this is not an impact crater but something rising from the surface"

Deuem, there is absolutely nothing that "sounds silly" when you are simply relating what you are seeing in this photo!! I think what you are saying - to paraphrase - you are seeing an anomalous object. Nothing silly about that at all.

To try to "define" what we are seeing, with our eyes, in these photos, is somewhat difficult. But then such is life, as we search for, and find, anomalous objects.

I really appreciate your interest, and your desire to really see objects as you work with the photos. Now, if you could just get rid of that brown thatchy stuff in the photo...................................then we might could get somewhere with this!!!