Among a number of similar hillocks and mesas in a region of Mars called Cydonia Mensae, one feature stood out. It was 1976, and Viking I was sending its latest images.
#CYDONIA FACE OF MARS SERIES#
There, in yet another series of photographs from Mars, is a distinct human face. But then, as it finishes printing the second page, your eye catches that long sheet of perforated printer paper folding into a pile on the floor, and you see something unbelievable. You’ve heard this all before and seen a million badly printed images. You’re startled, but annoyed and as it starts hammering out its latest data, you try to go back to sleep. You start to drowse off in your chair, when suddenly the teletype jumps to life with a loud mechanical bang. The coffee’s cold and, outside, the rain drums steadily against the window. Imagine yourself in a NASA control room, late at night. Today’s sponsor: This episode of 365 Days of Astronomy is sponsored by the Amateur Astronomers from Launceston Tasmania. He has appeared on numerous radio shows and television documentaries. A Silicon Valley computer scientist by trade, Brian now uses new media to promote critical thinking. Brian is also the author of two books based on the podcast, Skeptoid and Skeptoid II. Skeptoid has a weekly audience of 70,000 listeners. But photography, the perceptual phenomenon called pareidolia, and the Law of Large Numbers combine to say that it’s simply a natural hill.īio: Brian Dunning is the host and producer of the podcast Skeptoid: Critical Analysis of Pop Phenomena ( ), applying critical thinking to paranormal and pseudoscientific subjects promoted by the mass media. Some believe it’s proof of a Martian civilization. : Today we look at the face on Mars in the Cydonia Mensae region. Erosion has completely removed these layers in most places, leaving behind only the small isolated hills and knobs seen today. These ledges are made of more resistant layers of rock and are the last remnants of layers that once were continuous across this entire region. Many of the knobs in Cydonia, including the "face," have several flat ledges partway up the hill slopes. Since that time the Mars Orbiter Camera on the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft has provided detailed views of this hill that clearly show that it is a normal geologic feature with slopes and ridges carved by eons of wind and downslope motion due to gravity. The 3-km long "face" knob was first imaged by the Viking spacecraft in the 1970's and was seen by some to resemble a face carved into the rocks of Mars. In this "big picture" view the Cydonia region is seen to be covered with dozens of interesting knobs and mesas that are similar in many ways to the knob named the "face" - so many in fact that it requires care to discover the "face" among this jumble of knobs and hills. This image provides a broad perspective of the landscape and geology of the Cydonia region, showing numerous knobs and hills that have been eroded into a remarkable array of different shapes. The THEMIS infrared camera provides an excellent regional view of Mars - this image covers an area 32 kilometers (~20 miles) by approximately 200 kilometers (~125 miles) at a resolution of 100 meters per picture element ('pixel'). Minor spectral differences (infrared "color") also exist between the different filters, but these differences are small in this region due to the uniform composition of the rocks and soils exposed at the surface. The major differences between the different filters are due to the expected variation in the amount of energy emitted from the surface at different wavelengths. The major differences seen in this region are due to temperature effects - sunlit slopes are warm (bright), whereas those in shadow are cold (dark), The temperature in this scene ranges from ~50 ☌ (darkest) to ~15 ☌ (brightest). The calibrated and geometrically projected data from all of the nine surface-viewing filters are shown in this figure. The THEMIS infrared camera has ten different filters between 6.2 and 15 micrometers - nine view the surface and one views the COĪtmosphere. The "face" is located near the center of the image approximately 1/6 of the way down from the top, and is one of a large number of knobs, mesas, hills, and buttes that are visible in this THEMIS image. This set of THEMIS infrared images shows the so-called "face on Mars" landform located in the northern plains of Mars near 40° N, 10° W (350 ° E). Click the image above for a larger view.
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