NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter finds possible evidence of salty water on Mars

reply to post by Soylent Green Is People


Something is wrong here.

For YEARS ow, members at ATS have been pointing out these seasonal black streaks staining the Martian landscapes, flowing down hillsides and crater rims as possible liquid water erupting from fissures and subsurface areas, and for years NASA and people who jump on the NASA bandwagon as a matter of course, have been rubbishing what we've said and arguing that the dark streaks are not water, but are in fact melting CO2.

Now...it's water suddenly and all of us who have been getting eye rolls for saying so are what..mean't to forget we've been lambasted for saying so?

No apologies or acknowledgements, that in the abcense of official arrogance we would have identified the black streaks as water flows years ago?

I didn't think so.

reply to post by MysterX

Spot on mate!
The difference between us freethinkers and them is in the simple fact they can't think with their own heads and needs to wait official opinion, so they can copy/paste what was being said by scientists, where we are always ready to get caught with problems and try to solve it.

MysterX
reply to post by Soylent Green Is People

 

Something is wrong here.

For YEARS ow, members at ATS have been pointing out these seasonal black streaks staining the Martian landscapes, flowing down hillsides and crater rims as possible liquid water erupting from fissures and subsurface areas, and for years NASA and people who jump on the NASA bandwagon as a matter of course, have been rubbishing what we've said and arguing that the dark streaks are not water, but are in fact melting CO2.

Now...it's water suddenly and all of us who have been getting eye rolls for saying so are what..mean't to forget we've been lambasted for saying so?

No apologies or acknowledgements, that in the abcense of official arrogance we would have identified the black streaks as water flows years ago?

I didn't think so.

I'm not sure why you are directing this me.

I said these streaks could be water back in 2006 when the Mars Global Surveyor probe first noticed streaks in a crater wall that were not there in pictures taken of the same crater in 1999. Granted, I also wondered if the streaks could have been fine silt rather than water -- but I thought the water explanation was a more than plausible one even back then.

Even today, while I still have questions about the methodology so I can be sure the stuff in these images is not fine silt, I am a believer in water most probably existing under the surface of Mars, and that these streaks could very well be water, and I have said so in my posts.

HOWEVER --- Just because I think there is liquid groundwater on mars does not mean I can't question this new finding. I don't automatically believe every potential discovery simply because it matches my pre-conceived notions. I will still put it through some scrutiny in my mind, even if I generally accept the underlying notions of the discovery.


By the way, there are still some OTHER streaks on Mars that are still probably caused by CO2 rather than water:
spacefellowship.com...

BomSquad
reply to post by Soylent Green Is People

 

I see your point. One article I read did state that the observations were made over 2 years..but they didn't specify whether it was 2 Earth years or 2 Mars years. It would make a difference since a single Mars years is nearly 2 Earth years long.

That's wasn't exactly my question.

I was wondering if they looked at the exact same crater over the course of two or more seasonal cycles and noticed the outflows occurred at the same time in the same place over the course of two or more successive seasons.

The article says they looked at several locations over a 2 year span, but I wanted to know if that meant that they continuously looked at those several locations (i.e., checked up on them regularly) over the 2-year span, or did they simply look for 2 years and found many various locations of streaks over those two years.

What I mean is, did they find specific slopes that went through seasonal cycles as follows:
no streaks, streaks, no streaks, streaks, no streaks
rather than just finding streaks once in a seasonally sunlit area where there were no streaks previously.

reply to post by Soylent Green Is People


Wasn't directed at you per se, but as you mentioned NASA observing these streaks over a 2 year period, (Earth or Martian?) it struck a chord in me - and the frustration rose for the reasons i made in the post, mainly saying the same thing as NASA has 'just announced' for longer than 2 years, and being scoffed at for our troubles, not by you (not that i can remember in any case) though.

The second half of the post wasn't directed at you, more a general soapbox moment.

Hope you didn't take offence, none was intended.

reply to post by BomSquad


Hmmm.... Nasa admits this in 2013?
Someone, here on ATS has discovered the same thing in 2009....
Liquid (water) flow on Mars, Now

Arken
reply to post by BomSquad

 

Hmmm.... Nasa admits this in 2013?
Someone, here on ATS has discovered the same thing in 2009....
Liquid (water) flow on Mars, Now

NASA had been discussing the possibility that these streaks are liquid water-related even earlier than that. Here is a NASA press release from 2006 that discusses similar streaks:

NASA Images Suggest Water Still Flows in Brief Spurts on Mars

reply to post by Arken


Admits? What a strange word to use. Did you miss the word "possibly" in the article?

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed to scientists slender dark markings -- possibly due to salty water - that advance seasonally down slopes surprisingly close to the Martian equator.

Suggestions that it could be salty water have been put out for a while, but there's still no solid (or liquid) proof. All we know is that those are seasonal dark streaks, and we've been seeing lots of them on Mars. They are usually explained as dark sand escaping from under CO2 ice. blogs.discovermagazine.com...

So unless there is more immediate evidence (such as spectroscopy), my money is on dark sand.

MysterX
reply to post by Soylent Green Is People

 

Something is wrong here.

For YEARS ow, members at ATS have been pointing out these seasonal black streaks staining the Martian landscapes, flowing down hillsides and crater rims as possible liquid water erupting from fissures and subsurface areas, and for years NASA and people who jump on the NASA bandwagon as a matter of course, have been rubbishing what we've said and arguing that the dark streaks are not water, but are in fact melting CO2.

Now...it's water suddenly and all of us who have been getting eye rolls for saying so are what..mean't to forget we've been lambasted for saying so?

No apologies or acknowledgements, that in the abcense of official arrogance we would have identified the black streaks as water flows years ago?

I didn't think so.

Sorry but no where does it say that NASA says it IS water, just that it COULD be, they are just guessing at the moment. Jury is still definitely out on this.

To me it just looks like lines of fine sand.

Do we have any similar features here on Earth to compare it too?

reply to post by wildespace


Sorry didn't read your above post, iv just repeated your comments.

doorhandle
To me it just looks like lines of fine sand.

Do we have any similar features here on Earth to compare it too?

Yes, on sand dunes:





Imagine that the sand is dark (basaltic in origin) and that the surface is covered in lighter material. Sand slides or avalanches would creat such dark streaks as we see on Mars.

reply to post by wildespace


Yup good pictures, and factor in a 'low' res camera shot taken from orbit and yes its more likely just sand-like run offs...but hey, ya never know.