2015 NASA discovery of flowing water on Mars actually just sand

[Perrine]

[quote]An announcement by NASA in 2015 that liquid water had been found on Mars was premature, according to new research.

At a news conference that year, NASA's director of planetary science declared: "Liquid water has been found on Mars."

Scientists reasoned that water must be present on the red planet to explain mysterious darkish streaks that appeared to ebb and flow with the seasons.

However, while there is water on Mars - existing on the polar caps, ground ice, as well as in frosts and hydrated minerals - the evidence suggesting larger volumes of liquid water is ambiguous, according to researchers from the US Geological Survey.

In a new paper published in Nature Geoscience, they claim that Recurring Slope Lineae (RSL) in Eos Chasma, a deep depression on the planet, are "inconsistent with models for water sources".

The researchers - working in cooperation with the NASA Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project - found that the RSL were instead "identical to the slopes of sand dunes where movement is caused by dry granular flows".

"Water almost certainly is not responsible for this behaviour, which would require the volume of liquid to correspond to the length of slope available, producing more liquid on longer slopes.[/quote]

[url]https://news.sky.com/story/nasa-discovery-of-water-on-mars-was-actually-sand-11139736[/url]

[_charon]

This is why I hate sand
It gets everywhere

[Rantis]

Sand rivers are still cool.

[The_J_Hat]

[QUOTE=_charon;52917328]This is why I hate sand
It gets everywhere[/QUOTE]

Instead of a coursing river, they found a coarse river.

[Archival]

Makes sense but that being said, how does it account for it being seasonal and predictable?

[Jorori]

[QUOTE=The_J_Hat;52917405]Instead of a coursing river, they found a coarse river.[/QUOTE]

Man, it must've been rough for the people expecting to find liquid water

[Sableye]

the perchlorate brine theory was kind of a stretch anyways. with luck though the mars insight mission might find sub surface water with its deep drill

[chipsnapper]

I don’t like sand. It’s course and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.

[meanwhile]

[QUOTE=shad0w440;52917402]Sand rivers are still cool.[/QUOTE]

not when the sun is blazing on the sand they aren't

[butre]

[QUOTE=archival;52917436]Makes sense but that being said, how does it account for it being seasonal and predictable?[/QUOTE]

if it's really fine loosely packed airy sand like what you see in the middle east it could be just tidal effects from the sun causing it. mars doesnt have a whole lot of gravity of it's own to contend with and only one of its moon's are large enough and close enough to the planet to have any tidal effects at all so it's not unreasonable for it to just be tides

[Sableye]

[QUOTE=archival;52917436]Makes sense but that being said, how does it account for it being seasonal and predictable?[/QUOTE]

mars's orbit predictably raises and lowers the amount of sunlight the planet recieves, and there is a predictable winter and summer seasons where the planet completely covers over in sandstorms

like earth it is tilted on its axis and that exposes the polar caps to much higher temperatures, and creates a driving force between hemishperes, and that drives wind as co2 is released from the ice caps and the atmosphere heats up considerably

[benos28]

[QUOTE=chipsnapper2;52917514]I don’t like sand. It’s course and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.[/QUOTE]

Lol reminds of that Jack Shep vertical comic from Lost when Flocke asked if he was okay. :p

[SirDrone]

[QUOTE=chipsnapper2;52917514]I don’t like sand. It’s course and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.[/QUOTE]

I love sand. It's soft and firm and it massages the space in-between everywhere.

[paindoc]

[QUOTE=butre;52917696]if it's really fine loosely packed airy sand like what you see in the middle east it could be just tidal effects from the sun causing it. mars doesnt have a whole lot of gravity of it's own to contend with and only one of its moon's are large enough and close enough to the planet to have any tidal effects at all so it's not unreasonable for it to just be tides[/QUOTE]

I'd have to run the numbers at work, but it still seems pretty unreasonable for it to be tides. The tidal effects from the sun are miniscule, and even Deimos is 6.8x10^6 times less massive than the moon (it has a surface gravity of ~0.006m/s^2, for example). So, I really really doubt there's much chance of it being this.

More likely, and still a sort of tide, [URL="https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/multimedia/pia16478.html"]could be Mars' atmospheric tides[/URL]