Apparently a Mysterious Light From Mars That So Far Has No Official Explanation

[Cebu_4_2]

Apparently a Mysterious Light From Mars That So Far Has No Official Explanation Apr. 8, 2014 9:53am Jonathon M. Seidl (http://www.theblaze.com/author/jonathon-m-seidl/)




Take a long, hard look at the picture below:
http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/ScreenSnapz003-620x359.jpg (http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/ScreenSnapz003.jpg)Image source: NASA via the Houston Chronicle

Do you see the bright object in the background? How about now using a close-up?
http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/ScreenSnapz004-620x362.jpg (http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/ScreenSnapz004.jpg)Image source: NASA via the Houston Chronicle

That is apparently a mysterious light captured by the Mars rover Curiosity last week. So far, the light has no official explanation. NASA hasn’t even claimed the photo. In fact, it’s not even known if the photo is legit, although it is spreading across the Internet.
But that hasn’t stopped some from speculating. The Houston Chronicle has some of the theories (http://www.chron.com/news/strange-weird/article/NASA-photo-captures-strange-bright-light-coming-5382677.php#photo-6131485):

Although the space agency hasn’t issued any official statement yet about the phenomenon, bloggers and NASA enthusiasts have started chiming in.
Scott C. Waring, who maintains the website UFO Sightings Daily (http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/2014/04/mysterous-light-beams-from-mars-surface.html), posted the photo April 6.
Waring noted that the light shines upward, as if from the ground, and is very flat across the bottom.
“This could indicate there there is intelligent life below the ground and uses light as we do,” Waring wrote on his website. “This is not a glare from the sun, nor is it an artifact of the photo process.”
Still, there is one plausible explanation that comes from a commenter on the site Reddit: an electrified dust devil. One person linked to a story from 2005 (http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/050721dustdevils.htm) that appears to show something similar captured by the other Mars rover, Spirit:
http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/ScreenSnapz005-620x489.jpg (http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/ScreenSnapz005.jpg)Image source: Mars rover Spirit via Thunderbolts.info



“These martian dust devils dwarf the five-to-10 meter terrestrial ones, can be greater than 500 meters in diameter and several thousand meters high. The track patterns are known to change from season to season, so these huge dust pipes must be a large factor in transporting dust and could be responsible for eroding landforms,” Dr. Peter Smith of the University of Arizona said (http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2004/apr/HQ_04131_mars_dust.html) in a NASA press release in 2004.


A call to NASA was not immediately returned. If it ends up being anything else, we’ll let you know.

[Ares]

Moonlight reflected off Swamp gas.... Mystery solved

/sarcasm

[Cebu_4_2]

Swamp gas? I didn't know they had moonlight.

[Ares]

Swamp gas? I didn't know they had moonlight.

Mars has 2 moons(Phobos and Deimos), so double the possibility of moonlight. However a better question is what was the source of swamp gas, as swamp gas is generated usually by decaying organic matter.

Also, I was being highly sarcastic in my first post. :)

[Santa]

Mars has 2 moons(Phobos and Deimos), so double the possibility of moonlight. However a better question is what was the source of swamp gas, as swamp gas is generated usually by decaying organic matter.

Also, I was being highly sarcastic in my first post. :)

Sarcastic swamp gas is not to be tolerated on issues pertaining to Mars. It goes against section 51 of the UN code of interplanetary policy mandates. :)

[Horn]

Appears to have too much contrast for a dust devil.

Looks like a glowing white monolith.

[Neuro]

Appears to have too much contrast for a dust devil.

Looks like a glowing white monolith.
Racist!

[Serpo]

o, That’s NOT an Artificial Light on Mars

887 (http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?s=100&p[title]=Did+Mars+Curiosity+See+an+Alien+Light+on+Mars%3F+ Duh.+No.&p[summary]=Apparently+April+is+the+month+to+debunk+astronomi cal+foolishness,+for+I+have+yet+another+bit+of+spa ce+silliness+to+disassemble.+Yesterday,+the+Housto n+Chronicle+ran+a+story+showing+a+picture+from+the +Mars+Curiosity+rover,+which+has+been+exploring+th e+fourth+rock+from+the+Sun+since+August+2012.+As+t he...&p[ref]=sl_live&p[0]=http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_light_right_590.jpg/_jcr_content/renditions/cq5dam.web.1280.1280.jpeg&p[url]=http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html) 304 (http://twitter.com/search?q=http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html)
49 (http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html#comments)
By Phil Plait (http://www.slate.com/authors.phil_plait.html)
http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_light_right_590.jpg.CROP.original-original.jpg (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/proj/msl/redops/ods/surface/sol/00589/opgs/edr/ncam/NRB_449790582EDR_F0310000NCAM00262M_.JPG) An alien beacon? A transdimensional portal to an alternate Universe? Or just a blip in a photo? You decide (but it's the last one). Click to enaresenate.
Photo by NASA/JPL-Caltech


Apparently April is the month to debunk astronomical foolishness, for I have yet another bit of space silliness to disassemble.

Yesterday, the Houston Chronicle ran a story (http://www.chron.com/news/strange-weird/article/NASA-photo-captures-strange-bright-light-coming-5382677.php) showing a picture from the Mars Curiosity rover, which has been exploring the fourth rock from the Sun since August 2012. As the rover moves over the Martian surface it deploys an arsenal of tools to examine its environment.

That, of course, includes cameras. Many of the pictures are visually stunning, and some are plain old weird. After all, they’re shots of the landscape on an alien world!

But some folks take the word “alien” a bit too metaphorically. In the Chronicle article, the writer, Carol Christian, points out one particular picture (shown above) that depicts a spray of light that looks to be off in the distance. She wrote, “A NASA camera on Mars has captured what appears to be artificial light emanating outward from the planet's surface.”

http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/Authors/phil_plait-authorbio.png Phil Plait (http://www.slate.com/authors.phil_plait.html) Phil Plait writes [I]Slate’s Bad Astronomy blog and is an astronomer, public speaker, science evangelizer, and author of Death from the Skies! (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001FA0LY4/?tag=slatmaga-20) Follow him on Twitter (https://twitter.com/badastronomer).




Follow (https://twitter.com/BadAstronomer)


Right, artificial. That’s the first conclusion we should jump to. But then, instead of asking any of a dozen scientists or science journalists who might actually be able to supply an answer, she just quotes the site she got the image from: UFO Sightings Daily (http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/2014/04/mysterous-light-beams-from-mars-surface.html).*

Yes, you read that right. The Houston Chronicle is repeating a story they found on a UFO conspiracy site.

When I saw the picture, I knew right away it wasn’t from some artificial source. It wasn’t even really a light source on Mars! I’ve worked with astronomical cameras for many, many years, and we see little blips like this all the time. To make sure though, I asked my friend Emily Lakdawalla (http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/), who is also a planetary scientist and journalist. Her immediate response: cosmic ray.

Ah, of course. Cosmic rays (http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2009/11/02/attack_of_the_galactic_subatomic_particles.html) are charged subatomic particles (like protons, electrons, and so on) zipping around in space. On Earth, our atmosphere absorbs them so they don’t have much of an effect on cameras down here. But if you put a telescope in space, they are bombarded by these little beasties. When a cosmic ray slams into the electronic detector in the camera, it deposits some energy in the pixel (or pixels) where it hits. These detectors are designed to detect energy from incoming light, and they can’t tell the difference between a cosmic ray hit and a photon coming from a distant star. All they do is register the energy (you can read a lot more about this on a page where I dismantled claims about Planet X (http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/planetx/soho.html)).

And that’s what we have here. Curiosity was taking a picture of the Martian horizon, and during the time the picture was taken, a subatomic particle smacked into the camera, leaving behind its trail of energy. It’s a camera artifact, not a real one.

How can I know the light isn’t real, and is just inside the camera itself? Because the camera is the NAVCAM (http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/04/24/mars_curiosity_rover_sees_landscape_in_3d.html), which is actually two cameras, one on the right and one on the left. This provides a binocular view of the landscape, which can be used (just like our own eyes do) to determine distances to objects. At the same time NAVCAM RIGHT (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?rawid=NRB_449790582EDR_F0310000NCAM00262M_&s=589) took the picture with the light in it, NAVCAM LEFT (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?rawid=NLB_449790582EDR_F0310000NCAM00262M_&s=589) also took a picture … and there’s no light. Here are both pictures so you can compare them:

http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_light_leftright.jpg.CROP.original-original.jpg Photo by NASA/JPL-Caltech


See? It’s in one camera’s picture but not the other, even though they were taken at the same time (on April 3, 2014, at 10:00:03 UTC).
(http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?rawid=NRB_449790582EDR_F0310000NCAM00262M_&s=589)

To make this even more clear, I made an animated GIF of the two shots (http://imgur.com/gallery/9Sg5cAI):

http://i.imgur.com/9Sg5cAI.gif (http://imgur.com/gallery/9Sg5cAI)
As you can see, the landscape shifts a bit due to the different perspectives of the two cameras. The light is in one shot, but not the other.

I’ll note we see this kind of thing all the time, including in Curiosity images. Here’s one over a rock (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/msss/00107/mcam/0107MR0682028000E1_DXXX.jpg), for example. It’s not hard to find more if you peruse the Curiosity raw images archive (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/) (or the Unmanned Spaceflight forum (http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showforum=59), where space aficionados post and discuss the latest images from various missions).

Top Comment
I am re-reporting your story, using the first picture and headlining it "Giant Arrow Discovered on Mars!" More...

-ChinaGamerGuy
49 Comments (http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html#comments) Join In (http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html#comments)

So that’s what we have here. It’s not some alien rave, or a stranded bug-eyed monster signaling for help, or other fanciful fiction. No, it’s far more mundane, merely the quantized energy deposited by a subatomic particle that was accelerated in the magnetic fields of an exploded star and traveled thousands of light years across the galaxy at nearly the speed of light to finally slam into an electronic camera mounted on a mobile nuclear-powered laser-eyed chemical laboratory humans sent to another planet.

Clearly, reality’s not cool enough. We need to add aliens to make this a story.

Sigh.

(My very sincere and very large thanks to Emily Lakdawalla for help on this.)

*Correction, April 8, 2014: This post originally misstated the name of the website UFO Sightings Daily.


http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html



but what about this...................



(http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html)http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-9rqTdH_uH1w/Td51M-NGw8I/AAAAAAAAG2s/zrVhvITPKlw/s1600/a_mars.jpg (http://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&docid=2UtluqrPr_24wM&tbnid=2kDxQy_tdDZx2M:&ved=0CAgQjRw4Fw&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcherylkicksass.blogspot.com%2F201 1%2F05%2Fhoaxes-thrive-in-us-as-multi-million.html&ei=cVREU9_oPI3akgWWjoHoBQ&psig=AFQjCNF0BjZmrfqjUB4nbizZ5cEEV8g3vQ&ust=1397073394108918)


(http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html)

[Neuro]

The way it is blinking it must be a lighthouse!

[StreetsOfGold]

With computer animation, you can do anything.
Computer animated rover on a computer animated mars with a "mysterious" "LIGHT" to keep the Mars FRAUD alive and interesting.

Oh puke!

[Serpo]

My first thoughts was this...............http://girr.org/girr/tips/tips2/fa_wb_nose.jpg

[Norweger]

Probably somebody out camping and having a good time in the Nevada Desert.

[Glass]

I think it's just a broken pixel or maybe a couple pixels on the imaging device or something happened during the signal processing stage.

[Horn]

http://www.slate.com/content/dam/slate/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_light_leftright.jpg.CROP.original-original.jpg
(http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/08/curiosity_photo_light_seen_on_mars_is_a_camera_art ifact_not_a_real_one.html)

Actually in this second slide (from the left eyeball) where there appears to be nothing.

There is actually a something missing in the precise location, if you look closely...

You have to put your hand over one eye to see it..

[Norweger]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3Y3M0rJPn4

[Neuro]

Actually in this second slide (from the left eyeball) where there appears to be nothing.

There is actually a something missing in the precise location, if you look closely...

You have to put your hand over one eye to see it..
Yes, you are right! A candleshaped blur, that thing was edited out at that particular place! Which means something was there, but a shill was sent out to convince people it wasn't there...

On Mars surface one can rule out any type of combustion anyway, since its atmosphere has 96% CO2, and way less than a % of oxygen and it is very low pressure... Unless it is some type of gas (methane oxygen or carbonmonoxide oxygen mix) coming from beneath the surface...

[Serpo]

Yes, you are right! A candleshaped blur, that thing was edited out at that particular place! Which means something was there, but a shill was sent out to convince people it wasn't there...

On Mars surface one can rule out any type of combustion anyway, since its atmosphere has 96% CO2, and way less than a % of oxygen and it is very low pressure... Unless it is some type of gas (methane oxygen or carbonmonoxide oxygen mix) coming from beneath the surface...


cant see it myself

[Neuro]

cant see it myself
Are you able to enlarge the pics?

[Serpo]

Yes until I just get pixels

[Glass]

Yes, you are right! A candleshaped blur, that thing was edited out at that particular place! Which means something was there, but a shill was sent out to convince people it wasn't there...

On Mars surface one can rule out any type of combustion anyway, since its atmosphere has 96% CO2, and way less than a % of oxygen and it is very low pressure... Unless it is some type of gas (methane oxygen or carbonmonoxide oxygen mix) coming from beneath the surface...

You realise this means man will never be able to live on Mars. It's already got too much global climate change warming. The ancients must have drunk a lotta lotta beer. Personally I think it's the upsize free mega gulp that are the culprit. Speaking of which.

[Neuro]

Can you see the 'aura' of the flare? It is also in the non-flare picture...

[Glass]

maybe I can see some pixel variation around the head/aura of the white section and possibly just to the left on the crest of the hill. Possibly someone used a stamp tool to copy a section of the image on the left and paste it over. Not really enough definition to be confident.

The white section is pure white. That seems more like a technical glitch to me than anything else.

[Neuro]

You realise this means man will never be able to live on Mars. It's already got too much global climate change warming. The ancients must have drunk a lotta lotta beer. Personally I think it's the upsize free mega gulp that are the culprit. Speaking of which.
The average temp on Mars is -60° C, Venus also have around 96% CO2 in its atmosphere but its surface temp is 450° C. The main difference between these planets is the fact that Venus has about 1000 times the mass of atmosphere compared to Mars, and therefore it is much better to hold heat. Earth is somewhere in between in terms of mass of atmosphere and therefor has a comfortable temperature around 15° C. If you correlate Venus atmosphere with Earths, iow you measure the temperature at Venus at the height where pressure is equal to earths surface pressure, you have a temperature which is, if I remember correctly, around 55°C, which would be earths surface temperature if it was at Venus distance from the sun...

Sometimes Venus atmosphere and temperature is hung up as a scary example of what could happen if you have a runaway increase of green house gases on earth, by the warmistas, but they forget to mention it is because Venus atmosphere is 70 times heavier than Earths. They will never mention the atmosphere of Mars as an example, even though it has similar concentration of CO2...

[Horn]

Do you think climate change alarmists would get excited at the idea of detaching the moon from earths orbit, and relocating it to Mars?