NASA’s InSight Mars rover (InSight) observed a magnitude 4 earthquake on December 24, 2021. Scientists later learned that the earthquake was caused by a meteor impact and was the largest impact NASA has recorded since exploring Mars. . In particular, this meteoroid excavated boulder-sized ice blocks near the equator of Mars, because ice is an important resource for future activities on Mars, including for drinking water, agriculture and rocket propellant, etc., but due to previous Ice has never been found near the Martian equator, so the implications are even more profound.
The new crater, discovered by scientists with the Mars Color Imager (MARCI) on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) satellite, determined that the quake was caused by a meteor impact. MARCI aims to create daily global images of Mars, allowing scientists to observe large-scale weather changes. The meteoroid is estimated to be about 5 to 12 meters wide, small enough to burn up in Earth’s atmosphere. However, because the density of the Martian atmosphere is only 1% of that of Earth, it can hit the Martian ground, causing a crater 150 meters wide and 21 meters deep, and even ejecting material up to 37 kilometers away.
InSight aims to study the crust, mantle and core structure of Mars, and observing seismic waves is its core mission. Since landing in November 2018, InSight has detected 1,318 Martian earthquakes, some caused by meteor impacts. InSight’s solar panels are currently obscured by dust, have seen a sharp drop in power in recent months, and are expected to shut down within six weeks to end the mission. The relevant research results will be published in the journal Science, which will be published on October 27.
▲ Boulder-sized chunks of water ice are visible on the edge of an impact crater on Mars, as seen by the High Resolution Imaging Science Facility (HiRISE camera) on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter satellite. The crater is located in the Amazonian plain and was hit by a meteoroid on December 24, 2021, forming a crater about 150 meters wide.
(This article is reproduced with permission from the Taipei Planetarium; image source: NASA)
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