© NASA/JPL-Caltech/UAA Martian dust devil roughly 12 miles (20 kilometers) high was captured winding its way along the Amazonis Planitia region of Northern Mars on March 14, 2012 by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Despite its height, the plume is little more than three-quarters of a football field wide (70 yards, or 70 meters).
The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has now spotted a gigantic Martian dust devil roughly 20 kilometers (12 miles) high, churning through the Amazonis Planitia region of northern Mars. The HiRISE camera (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) captured the event on March 14, 2012. Scientists say that despite its height, the plume is just 70 meters (70 yards) wide.
Yikes! After seeing trucks thrown about by the tornadoes in Dallas yesterday, it makes you wonder how the MER rovers and even the Curiosity rover would fare in an encounter with a 20-km high twister.
The image was taken during late northern spring, two weeks short of the northern summer solstice, a time when the ground in the northern mid-latitudes is being heated most strongly by the sun.
Dust devils are spinning columns of air, made visible by the dust they pull off the ground. Unlike a tornado, a dust devil typically forms on a clear day when the ground is heated by the sun, warming the air just above the ground. As heated air near the surface rises quickly through a small pocket of cooler air above it, the air may begin to rotate, if conditions are just right.
Obviously, conditions were more than just right to create such a whopper.
Source: JPL
"Yikes! After seeing trucks thrown about by the tornadoes in Dallas yesterday, it makes you wonder how the MER rovers and even the Curiosity rover would fare in an encounter with a 20-km high twister."
I wonder how a habitat for a Mars crew would fare in such an encounter.
Why are we even considering a crewed mission to Mars? Forget, for a moment, of the problems and the dangers of the six-month -- each way -- transit time.
There's no magnetic field and ionosphere to block solar radiation. The low gravity would cause loss of bone and muscle mass. Dust storms can last for months -- the habitat could be buried. There's no infrastructure -- you couldn't call for replacements for damaged parts. Medical and surgical care would be rudimentary, at best.
For humans, Earth is the only habitable planet in the solar system.