ESA’s Mars Express probe was launched in 2003 and has been studying the geology of the Red Planet for nearly 20 years. Fly over the huge deserts and valleys of Mars, observe its structure and try to reconstruct its history.
Recently, she found herself observing something that at first glance could make anyone shiver. It looked like a giant eye embedded in the ground. It was actually a giant crater with some specks of dark matter that made it look like a star-gazing student.
It has a diameter of 30 kilometers and is located in an area in the southern hemisphere of Mars known as Onia Terra. It’s full of potholes in that area, and the subject matter of the new Mars Express photos is far from the biggest or most impressive. For example, not far from Lowell Crater, which has a diameter of 200 kilometers.
The unnamed crater of the eye is located in the earth dug by canals, which were probably formed by rivers of liquid water that flowed to the surface billions of years ago. In these channels you can see traces of a darker substance, as if it were some kind of basin in which debris and other things have accumulated.
Perhaps one day we can go visit it up close and look up to see what the great eye of Mars was staring at.
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