pogoda: Mars

Evidence: 80 • authority: 72

Valles Marineris (; Latin for Mariner Valleys, named after the Mariner 9 Mars orbiter of 1971–72 which discovered it) is a system of canyons that runs along the Martian surface east of the Tharsis region. At more than 4,000 km (2,500 mi) long, 200 km (120 mi) wide and up to 7 km (23,000 ft) deep, Valles Marineris is the largest canyon in the Solar System. Valles Marineris is located along the equator of Mars, on the east side of the Tharsis Bulge, and stretches for nearly a quarter of the planet's circumference. The canyon system starts in the west with Noctis Labyrinthus; proceeding to the east are Tithonium and Ius chasmata, then Melas, Candor and Ophir chasmata, then Coprates Chasma, the…

Evidence: 41 • authority: 72

This is a list of the tallest mountains in the Solar System. This list includes peaks on all celestial bodies where significant mountains have been detected. For some celestial bodies, different peaks are given across different types of measurement. The Solar System's tallest mountain is possibly the Olympus Mons on Mars with an altitude of 21.9 to 26 km. The central peak of Rheasilvia on the asteroid Vesta is also a candidate to be the tallest, with an estimated height between 19 and 22 km from peak to base. A 25 km tall mountain-like peak was detected via an occultation on the trans-Neptunian object 307261 Máni, qualifying it as one of the tallest known mountains in the Solar System, thou…

Evidence: 41 • authority: 72

The superlative, tallest mountain is often used when what is meant is highest mountain. The height of a mountain is normally expressed as its altitude above mean sea level. This means Mount Everest is the highest mountain above sea level on Earth, but it is not the tallest mountain, either on Earth or off it. There is no set standard for measuring how tall a mountain is. Since other Solar System planets or asteroids do not have large seas of water, unlike Earth, determining a "sea level" is not practical in all cases. Other ways need to be found to measure how tall a mountain is. This frequently makes measuring a mountain's tallness above its surrounding terrain more practical. One way to d…

Evidence: 33 • authority: 72

Mons Mouton is the Moon's tallest mountain that has been officially named. The base to peak height of this flat-topped mountain is 6 km (3.7 mi) per altimetry data from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. It is just under 100 km (62 mi) wide and lies between the craters Nobile and Malapert, within 6° of the lunar South Pole on the Moon's near-side. This is a region of special interest because of the presence of Permanently Shadowed Regions (PSRs) that could be cold traps for water, together with areas of extended solar illumination in their proximity. Mons Mouton is possibly a remnant of the rim of the South Pole–Aitken basin - one of the oldest, largest and deepest impact craters in the Sola…

Evidence: 27 • authority: 72

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, it was erroneously believed that there were "canals" on the planet Mars. These were a network of long straight lines on Mars, observed by astronomers using early telescopes without photography, that were believed to be engineering works or waterways via the mistranslation of Schiaparelli’s term canali ("channels") into English as “canals.” Modern historians of science widely agree that the Martian canals were a perceptual and linguistic artifact, arising from telescope limitations combined with optical illusions. They were first described by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli during the opposition of 1877, and attested to by later obs…

Evidence: 27 • authority: 72

Olympus Mons (; Latin for 'Mount Olympus') is a large shield volcano on Mars. As measured by the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA), it is 21.287 kilometres (69,840 ft) high, about 2.5 times the elevation of Mount Everest above sea level. It is Mars's tallest volcano, its tallest planetary mountain, and is approximately tied with Rheasilvia on Vesta as the tallest mountain currently discovered in the Solar System. It is associated with the volcanic region of Tharsis Montes. It last erupted 25 million years ago. Olympus Mons is the youngest of the large volcanoes on Mars, having formed during the Martian Hesperian Period with eruptions continuing well into the Amazonian Period. It has been…

Evidence: — • authority: 65