ESA gives Cydonia a new perspective

Undercut? As in a cantilever feature?

Can you estimate the dimensions of the unsupported part? And does anyone have the info needed to estimate how far unsupported stone could project in a .3g gravity well?

LB

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Undercut? As in a cantilever feature?

Can you estimate the dimensions of the unsupported part? And does anyone have the info needed to estimate how far unsupported stone could project in a .3g gravity well? [LB]
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

It looks more like the "beard strands" are supported by webing or under trussing. I haven't looked at the size of any of the strands but there looks like some likely candidates hanging over the bottom mesa border that should be fairly easy to measure. It would seem more inportant to me to find out the material the beard is made of. Is there any sensing equipment aboard the satelites that could tell us that?

I found a partial answer to my question on Trinket's link on another thread: [Re: Mawrth Vallis].

"Clays at Mawrth Vallis were first identified in data from the OMEGA instrument on the European Space Agency's Mars Express orbiter. The CRISM instrument on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has identified aluminum-rich and iron-rich clays in this region, each with a unique distribution."

I guess if CRISM can distiguish aluminum-rich clays it can see an aluminum "beard."

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Larry Burford</i>
<br />Can you estimate the dimensions of the unsupported part? <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">Yes, if you go back and look at the image above where I estimated the width of the platform to the west of the mouth at about 450 feet (area 3), I'd say there are two "strands" that are at least that size, and one of them could be twice that.

There's one pointing south east (if the face was rotated into the vertical orientation) that's about 450', and there's another one considerably longer above that (to the east) pointing in a more eastern direction, just below that small slide area (area 1) on that same image. Each of the strands is sort of a composite of multiple strands.

rd

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by neilderosa</i>
<br />Is there any sensing equipment aboard the satelites that could tell us that?<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">Yes, I would think they must know by now.

rd

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by rderosa</i>
<br />Yes, I would think they must know by now.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">I doubt that the spectrometer (assuming there is one on Mars Express) has that much spatial resolution. And even if it did, who would have the incentive to point it at that precise location? Or to study the resulting spectrum (in whatever wavelength range was chosen) to try to identify the bands. Under most scenarios, the best we could hope for was a determination that the "beard" was, or was not, made of the same material as the mesa.

But why assume the "beard" is unsupported? -|Tom|-

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by tvanflandern</i>
<br />Under most scenarios, the best we could hope for was a determination that the beard was, or was not, made of the same material as the mesa. -|Tom|-<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">You're probably right.

You know, there's another thing that the beard gives us, now that we've seen it in 3D. It's the one piece of evidence that's still relatively intact (although it does appear to be knocked of kilter by the crater impact) that shows that the east side of the face was the same as the west side. Unless of course, lions have beards too. Do they?

rd