Mars Orbiter Captures Winter Wonderland in Summertime Mars
It’s starting to look like Christmas on Mars. Mars Express, the orbiter of the European Space Agency (ESA), captured breathtaking views of a winter wonderland, but it’s not your typical snowfall. According to ESA’s Mars Express orbiter, the south pole of Mars is covered with layers of dust and carbon dioxide ice, which creates the stunning scene in the southerly region Australe Scopuli. Mars only gets a few inches of snow, despite its extreme cold. Due to the thin atmosphere of Mars, water ice turns into gas before it reaches the surface. Dry ice, on other hand, does reach the surface. On the one hand, water ice turns to gas before it touches the surface, due to the planet’s thin atmosphere; dry ice, on the other hand, does reach the surface.
Frosty swirls layered across the South Pole Of Mars. Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin 01.001010Although the images look like a winter wonderland at Mars’s south pole, they were actually taken in June when it was nearly summertime. According to an ESA press release, the Sun’s warming rays are causing seasonal ice layers on Mars to retreat. This is evident in the left-hand side of the picture where dark patches are swooping into the scene. As the pressure builds, the ice layers at the top begin to crack. Jets of gas burst through the surface carrying dark dust. The dust falls in a fan shape, guided by the wind, after it has burst through the ice. Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin.
In the above image of Australe Scopuli’s seasonal ice cap, layers of dust and ice overlap to create a swirling illusion across the Martian surface. This image was taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera aboard Mars Express. The digital terrain model allowed the topography to be determined. The image offers a closer look at the fan-shaped pattern created by the bursts of dust, creating boundaries between the layered deposits.
ESA’s Mars Express launched in 2003, and has provided breathtaking images of the Martian landscape for more than 20 years. According to ESA, the spacecraft created the most comprehensive map of Mars’ atmospheric chemical composition, observed Phobos and Deimos closely, and traced water’s history across Mars. Beagle 2 was also part of the mission, but it never performed any scientific activities on Mars.
