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To: NormsRevenge
Given Spirit's navigation camera images now in hand, many of the Mars rover science team sense that the rocks are possibly explosive volcanic deposits.

"But that's purely conjecture at this point ... a working hypothesis," Squyres said. "Everything is on the table until we've gotten more data down."

It's been a while since I studied geology, but those rocks definitely look extrusive. They look a lot like aa. I like the high resolution image because you can almost imagine that when it wasn't as weathered that you could see where volcanic gasses were trapped before expanding and escaping at the surface. It should be interesting to see how lava with a high quantity of trapped gases develops on Mars as compared to the Earth. With the lower atmospheric pressure I would expect that gas bubbles in rocks would be much larger and the jaggedness that starts on the surface of a rock would extend much deeper.

6 posted on 02/11/2006 12:27:11 AM PST by burzum (A single reprimand does more for a man of intelligence than a hundred lashes for a fool.--Prov 17:10)
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The outcrop now being studied is layered, but "we're not sure what it is yet...

Oh man! Just the opening Richard Hoagland needs to break out a new book, lecture series, and video.
7 posted on 02/11/2006 12:35:06 AM PST by carumba (The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you've got it made. Groucho)
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