Snow, frost and icy landscapes on the surface of Mars are an integral part of the Red Planet’s coldest season. Images obtained by the HiRISE camera aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft reveal magnificent views of the winter season of Mars.Looking at the photos taken, it is seen that Mars transforms into another world during the winter season. The winter on this barren planet is harsh, with temperatures dropping to minus 123 degrees below zero, resulting in snowscapes. You can see these views from the gallery at the end of the news.
It’s snowing on Mars
However, of course, no matter how cold the weather on Mars is, one should not expect a normal snowfall. Snow on Mars occurs in two types: water ice snow, as on Earth, and carbon dioxide or dry ice snow, which is formed because it is very cold. By the way, the weather on Mars is quite different from Earth because its atmosphere is very thin. Due to the atmosphere, which is only 1 percent of the density of Earth’s atmosphere, the biggest weather events are dust storms, not rainstorms.
“If you still want to ski, you’ll have to go to a crater or cliff edge where snow can accumulate on a sloping surface,” said Sylvain Piqueux, a Mars scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. used the phrases. However, snowfall on Mars occurs at the coldest extremes of the planet, namely its poles.
Snowflakes on Mars are cubic
Snowflakes on Earth have a crystalline six-sided structure, based on the principle of crystallization of water molecules. But when the snow on Mars is based on carbon dioxide, dry ice snowflakes form in cubes.
In fact, it has been known since the 1970s that there is frozen ice on Mars. It first captured water-based frost when NASA’s Viking rover landed on the planet. NASA’s Phoenix instrument, which was lowered within 1600 kilometers of the north pole of Mars in 2008, also detected water-ice snow falling to the surface. On the other hand, the snow falling on the surface of Mars, of course, does not stay on the surface permanently. With the end of the winter season, all the ice melts and sublimes.
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