Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars

NASA ^ | November 22, 2015 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: This moon is doomed. Mars, the red planet named for the Roman god of war, has two tiny moons, Phobos and Deimos, whose names are derived from the Greek for Fear and Panic. These martian moons may well be captured asteroids originating in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter or perhaps from even more distant reaches of the Solar System. The larger moon, Phobos, is indeed seen to be a cratered, asteroid-like object in this stunning color image from the robotic Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, recorded at a resolution of about seven meters per pixel. But Phobos orbits so close to Mars - about 5,800 kilometers above the surface compared to 400,000 kilometers for our Moon - that gravitational tidal forces are dragging it down. A recent analysis of the long grooves indicates that they may result from global stretching caused by tides -- the differing force of Mars' gravity on different sides of Phobos. These grooves may then be an early phase in the disintegration of Phobos into a ring of debris around Mars.

[Grimmy]

That’s not how it works and you know it.

Now that the Phobos has been declared to be in a state o’ Doom, it will be added to the endangered species list.

No touching. Hands off. Don’t even look at it unless you are in the presence and under the guidance of an officially approved member of the envirofascist movement.

[Hot Tabasco]

You sure that's not a potato?

It's certainly taken a lot of meteor and asteroid hits...........

[Hot Tabasco]

I’ve set a calendar reminder for 29 million years from now. Should be something to see!

Make sure you ping me..........

[SunkenCiv]

Definitely. Mars has as well. Our own Moon was believed by many to have been cratered by volcanism (this seems incomprehensible today) but the Apollo landings put the lie to that, so the volcano geeks moved the claims to another planet. The Ries Basin study E Shoemaker did in the 1950s had already started the process of ejecting them from Earth. :')

• Red Planet's Ancient Equator Located
• New Theory: Catastrophe Created Mars' Moons
• Mars moon emerges from the dark [Phobos]
• Red planet's hue due to meteors, not water

  "There is something of a paradox about Mars," agrees Joshua Bandfield of Arizona State University in Tempe. His team recently showed that the planet has no large deposits of carbonates, which should have formed if giant pools of water had persisted on the surface. Bandfield suggests that liquid water must have occasionally burst out of the ground, carving channels and gullies, but that it quickly froze again in the frigid Martian climate.

[SunkenCiv]

It's either the eventual human residents of Mars, or an inanimate blob of ice and rock. So, buh-bye "settlers".

[SunkenCiv]

[SunkenCiv]

Imagine how large the hard drives will be by then!

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks rawcatslyentist.

[SunkenCiv]

I agree, that’s how it rolls.

[SunkenCiv]

Sure, but there’s no recommended treatment, a Deimos dozen.

[Jack Hydrazine]

What has been seen cannot be unseen!

[BenLurkin]

This guy did them

[PIF]

Show us how you really feel ... :)

[cripplecreek]

It just seems odd to me that they would propose such a theory knowing full well that many other small bodies not related to mars have similar striations.

[BenLurkin]

Would love to see an “artist’s interpretation” of what Spaceship Phobos looked like -— when it was brand new.

[Jack Hydrazine]

That would be kewl!

[SunkenCiv]

The info on the Martian moons is a little better — the other cases of moon deformation due to tidal forces involve Jupiter, but Jupiter is ~2500 times more massive than Mars.

[SunkenCiv]

;’) Nah, I’d be given a timeout by the mods if I did that. ;’)

[SunkenCiv]

That’ll l’arn ya! ;’)

NOW you know why the whole darned Martian civilization went extinct — it was done in self-defense!

[Swordmaker]

Electric Universe PING for Phobos . . . which shows distinct linear craters and lines that are explainable by Electric Universe theories but are entirely inexplicable under standard gravity models (there is no way that the microgravity of Phobos could keep anything rolling and doing damage to its surface in a collision model)

If you want on or off the Electric Universe Ping List, Freepmail me.