Opportunity Rover finds Dome

a reply to: Eilasvaleleyn

Our oceans have salt, rivers and lakes don't. Some water on Earth has different content than others. Our waters are more acidic because of pollution. We have no idea what the environment was like on Mars when there were oceans. Mars believe it or not is still an alien planet. I bet Mars had various types of H2O, from oceans to hot springs, but my point being that it's Martian water and will be different than Earth, i.e. there could be something else in the water like alien bacteria.

Mars has a good history of volcanism too, who knows how that influenced the water environment...I know our under water volcanic vents put natural mercury into our oceans.

Therefore why we see strange rock and land formations on Mars could be from an alien water environment.

Erm, right, that confirms we aren't on the same page.

When I say "H2O", I'm talking about two hydrogen atoms bonded to an oxygen atom. The specific chemical molecule. H2O is H2O and only H2O. Like H2 is hydrogen gas, Cl2 is chlorine gas, etc. I'm not using H2O as a shorthand for "water" here. Do you get where I'm coming from?

Yeah, I agree with you, for the most part. Martian water would be different from earth water, but Martian H2O would be identical to Earth H2O, which would be identical to H2O on the other side of the universe.

a reply to: Eilasvaleleyn

Yes we aren't if you go back to page 8 and re-read my post you will see I'm specifically taking into consideration that strange looking rocks on Mars could be from a strange type of martian water that shapes rocks differently than Earth just like rocks, and coral look different on different parts of the world! Jeez!! Of course I know H20 is the same molecule on the other side of the Universe so is everything in the Periodic Table, when did I come across that I don't believe in the Big Bang?

a reply to: stevieray

exactly, the whole landscape is hilly and filled with mountains all look alike. The original picture shows a more round shape than that of the poster .
It is only to be rejected if opertunity drives from this point on to that " dome"

a reply to: VoidHawk

No more Dr. Who for you! Or, for me, since I thought the same thing...

It is weird looking. Solidified lava dome, perhaps? With the amount of wind on Mars, erosion exposed it?

Beautiful picture.

I like to think I'm an intelligent chap with a good set of eyes. In my opinion that is not a rock. If I were to see a photo taken on earth and that object was found in the background of the photo I would most certainly think it was an unnatural and artificial object. No doubt what so ever would cross my mind and I wouldn't feel the need to research it, but that's because we are on earth and would expect such a result.

With this photo taken on Mars you wouldn't expect such a result, and it seems because of that some people on this website are so quick to debunk the image that sometimes research isn't necessary to them at all. "It's on Mars where artificial objects don't exist", "Weather erosion", "Rocks are everywhere, so this is a rock!".

Well I'm going with my gut on this one and telling myself that it is an unnatural and artificial structure. I'm just voicing my opinion on this one and going to exit very quickly, so I will not be responding to the subsequent 'rockers' and wish you all a good weekend.

Even with pixelated photos it looks like a dome...rock dome...dome rock...rockish dome...domish rock.

I dunno anymore. It's weird.

That's clearly a natural formation.
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..
...

If I was an American tax payer I would be making a petition for this to be closely looked at, with NASA live streaming the rovers efforts of reaching the anomaly through a constant live stream. It may turnout to be something mundane, but by god, you paid for that rover, demand it!!


I also live in a dream world to which I know and doubt it will be possible to demand such a thing.

It looks like the dome of a "flying saucer". Notice the row of (square?) portholes in it.
Or a round boulder with a shiny lustre.

Using the measurements of the panoramic lenses from Opportunity Rover and some assumptions as identified by the points as I have identified in the image below is there a way to determine the distance from the lens these domed objects are? Or, eventually their height?

PanCam lens: 42.97 mm, f/20, +/- 11.25 deg; (a) layout and (b) spot diagram. Filter wheel wavelength coverage 0.40 to 1.1 mm. Spot size measured in microns.

Points described:

A: Center of the lens
A-A1: distance above the ground to center of lens in field of view
B: Size of rock assumed to be 12"-18"
C: Size of rock assumed to be 3x size of B
D and E: 25-30 degree elevation from Rover with an estimated height of 50ft above where Rover sits

Just noticed that Streetcap1 found this anomaly all the way back in July.

a reply to: bkfd54
So I'm going to embarrass myself. I was hoping there would be a photog or math wiz to help out with determining distances and size. I came to these calculations by using some internet based formulas for calculating object distances and heights. I will say using the information and assumptions I have posted this object is approx. 325 to 350 ft from the lens and is approx. 16.4 ft in height. It has a diameter of 32.8 ft based on my height estimation. I got a bit confused in the metric to imperial conversions.

Slam away!!!

a reply to: bkfd54

If the calculations are reasonably accurate with say, a 10% margin of error, that's a pretty huge rock to be so spherical.

a reply to: Urantia1111
That is not entirely true. Microbial life MAY have existed 3.5 Billion years ago when Mars still had water. But that is not my point. What if something from outside our solar system visited Mars in the ancient past and left stuff behind after they left. Much like all the garbage left behind from all the Apollo missions.

I get so tired of these Mars Curiosity threads and how NASA manipulates the public. they are constantly taking crappy pictures of unknown possibly man-made objects at a distance just enough to peak our curiosity(pun intended)and there is never any answers given never an investigation of what they are.
this is getting old fast...I'm over it.
It's possible this is what the mission was about from the beginning.giving us just enough to get us curious and never giving an answer.

a reply to: bkfd54

AlgorimancerPG says that the "dome" is some 130 metres away from the camera, so it looks like your calculations were not that bad.

a reply to: bkfd54
You could also make size/distance estimations using images from different locations by way of parallax. That was kind of the idea I had in reply to Tardacus.

This would require you to look through all of the images from the pertinent cameras at the dates in question and isolate (download) all the ones with the domes in them. By plotting out the date/location of the rover and comparing it to the image you could identify where this ridge is with the domes (round rocks) on top.
If you then view these images in succession a 3-D or parallax effect should become apparent and you could then get a good idea of size and distance. If you have the time and are interested in figuring out what this thing is then this is a great direction, sure beats arguing about the composition of water molecules.

I’m not sure why ArMaP’s post isn’t getting more attention.

originally posted by: ArMaP

originally posted by: BatheInTheFountain
Especially being that there is a smaller object to the right and what looks like a road/walkway/staircase/path?

Don't be fooled by the resized images, the original looks less anomalous.

There is quite a difference between these two images. The shiny dome feature as well as the 'pipeline look' appears to be pixel artifacts. Here is a link to the original image.
There are many images of rocks in that area showing a rounded and slightly shiny feature, seems to be a local phenomena.

originally posted by: TWILITE22
I get so tired of these Mars Curiosity threads and how NASA manipulates the public.

You are so tired that you didn't notice that this is from Opportunity, not Curiosity.

they are constantly taking crappy pictures of unknown possibly man-made objects at a distance just enough to peak our curiosity(pun intended)and there is never any answers given never an investigation of what they are.

As I said in a previous post, I see it in the opposite way, people keep on finding things that are on the limit of visibility, either because they are too far away or they are too small. What people's imagination say about the objects is not NASA's fault.

originally posted by: Devino
a reply to: bkfd54
You could also make size/distance estimations using images from different locations by way of parallax. That was kind of the idea I had in reply to Tardacus.

That's how AlgorimancerPG works, it uses two images from the left and right camera to make the calculations.