http://hiroc.lpl.arizona.edu/images/PSP/release_003.html

Oh, Lord! How am I ever going to keep up?

The answer is, I'm not -- James, I think your HiPOD idea is a great one. Whoever downloads one of these behemoths and sees something cool, please share it with the rest of us.

--Emily

This one is really breathtaking!
Candor Chasma

I guess HiRISE didn't like the idea of sharing relinquishing the spotlight for even a single day

What about this one? Layers in Becquerel Crater. Amazing.

Michael

This may confirm that MC Escher was a Martian...

The layering and fracturing in Holden crater is just astonishing!

Here are some screen shots.

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James

They're going to need to create a substantially more durable RAT for sampling down THAT sequence.

And the Becquerel crater image is just beyond words! A screen shot doesn't really do it justice, if you can manage the 1.2Gb download then you really should get it.

Nonetheless here is a screen shot anyway.

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James

Yes, Becquerel Crater. Crazy. 1.2GB. 3.17 gigapixel image. Crazy. Even Blu-Ray and HD-DVD will have a tough time keeping up with this kind of data volume.

And how about those dunes in Proctor Crater? How'd Opportunity do trying to traverse those? Forget about being buried up to its wheeltops. All you'd see sticking out the top of the sand would be

At first browse my personal favourite is the probable natural arch in Tartarus Colles. Oh to one day walk (or rove) underneath . . . .

LOL. This week has definately been a HUGE week for space news, including the positive identification of two lost Mars landers, the photographing of two others, very likely recent water on Mars, the space shuttle launch, etc. These are the days!

OMG!
My favourite views so far...
It is all so gigantic!

And not a single mention of Cassini! It must have been a slow week at Saturn.

Yes, it appears that we are in the midst of the space equivalent of the bibilical "seven fat years."

Amazing!

I couldn't resist to make a colorised version based on the Oppy color pic.
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We are living great time for space exploration

Guess so. There is a Titan flyby next week, other than that, it seems as though not alot of interesting stuff... Even Jason is downloading HiRISE images, of course, if you confront him he claims it's only to test his computer out;-)

Maybe I missed this before but reading HiBlog I noticed HiROC has a web page (courtesy of GuyMac) "answering JPEG-2000 questions" for those who download HiRISE imagery. And questions can be submitted via this link.

Many thanks to all who are posting interesting crops from these monsters. After three failed attempts to grab one of the 1.2 GB images, I think I'll try something smaller.

ngunn: Thanks for mentioning the amazing (possible) natural bridge. I might have missed that.

A turtoise, a frog and a fish! Plenty of water there

Kudos to Emily for finding THE coolest thing yet that isn't a Mars Rover.....

http://planetary.org/image/PSP_001420_2045_RED_bridge.jpg
from this blog entry...

http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00000793/



Doiug

Wow, that is pretty cool!

Not to detract from Emily, but wasn't the bridge first found by the HiRISE team and first noted yesterday by ngunn?

How cool would this be...?

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Sorry - didn't see that post - kudos to him as well

Doug

You're right. See here and here.

Colourised version of The Bridge...

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Indeed. Careful readers of both this forum and my blog have probably figured out that thanks to UMSF I can sometimes be very lazy efficient...

--Emily

I am guessing all those layers that we see are sedimentary layers made up of sulphate rock like the ones we have witnessed in Meridiani?!I presume we should have an idea now of the depth of the supposed lake deposits underneath Gusev crater!Right or wrong?If only we could have landed Spirit in one of these craters!

It would be premature to assume all those layers are Meridiani-like evaporites or cemented drifts. Don't forget Home Plate, which looks similar but is very different in composition and origin.

And so far Spirit has found absolutely no evidence of the supposed lake deposits, so no, we don't have any idea of their depth, or if they even exist. An alternative story might be more like a thick mud flow (or series of mud flows) mixed with impact ejecta as the non-lava component of the floor of Gusev. Some water in the mix, but never a body of standing water. And we might not have even seen those mud flows in Spirit data, maybe just the effects of water seeping into the layered ejecta deposits. It's still not clear exactly what happened in Gusev.

Phil

Interesting. I saw a praying man, a dinosaur skeleton behind him and an angel facing them both. Then I thought maybe it's not an angel, maybe it's an octopus or a Roomba
Rorschach planet indeed!

Would CRISM not give us an idea as to the make up of those layers?

Looking closely at the bottom of sand dunes in Proctor crater,there seem to be dark toned spots which dont seem to be neither rocks nor darker sand .Any ideas as to their nature?

Absolutely true, James.
The first one is really breathtaking, with dunes, orthogonal fractures and the abyss in the right/low portion.
Hope you'll enjoy this colorization.

Michelangelo! Ha rinviato!

thanks Stu, but comparison is a little excessive (and embarrassing too!!!)

PS: "rinviato" means "delayed" or "postponed", perhaps you want to say re-posted...

This link's been passed around the HiRISE team, you might find it interesting.
http://www.naturalarches.org/gallery-mars.htm

It's possible scattered light from under the 'bridge', if it is one, could be seen in the shadows if the dynamic range of the image allows. Bonestell painted numerous natural bridges on Mars, it would be nice to finally find one!

Don

I unsuccessfully tried looking for dune patterns in the shadow to the right of the "bridge" which, if consistent with those in the rest of the trough, could point to steady wind patterns through the area. I would expect to see piling of sand on one (or both) sides if it was collapsed.