Skywizard
29th June 2017, 20:57
IT’s shiny. It’s sharp. It’s on Mars. It must be aliens! What appears
to be a chunk of metal photographed by the Opportunity Rover has
UFO buffs in a spin.
http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/6e1c76b85dd71bc1f850364879160979
Composite image of the Mars Opportunity rover overlooking a canyon on Mars.
The high contrast infra-red image, published by the Mars Exploratino Rover Mission (Opportunity: Panoramic Camera: Sol 348) was uploaded by the Opportunity Rover on March 17.
It shows an unusually shiny, and jagged, object sitting neatly on top of the grainy surface of Mars’ Meridiani Planum.
It has internet chat forum Reddit in rapture.
http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/02115b9f22347bef6ae8582b1ec4e835
Image of a strange, metallic looking object from the Mars Opportunity rover.
“Uh NASA? UFO Caught on Mars Rover Mission? Is this real?” posted Prosaic Origin.
If it looks odd, of course it must be aliens!
But at least in this case the resolution is reasonably crisp. Not a blurry morass like most UFO ‘evidence’.
“Looks like light glimmering off of a genuine spaceship on an alien planet in outer space,” one commentator noted.
But, for that to be true, there’s the small matter of scale. At that distance from the Opportunity Rover, any inhabitants would probably have to be no larger than ants.
A more down to Earth (though admittedly this is Mars we’re talking about here) suggestion was that it could be a piece of debris from the rover itself, or a heat shield from the craft that delivered it.
Earthly trash is increasingly common on the Red Planet, especially after a string of mission failures in recent decades. Satellites have gone awry. Landers have crashed.
http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/e7ab67c3314b3ac4cf9aecf0f08bc875
Debris from the Mars Opportunity Rover's lander vehicle litters the
Martian landscape.
But even successful projects litter the landscape with debris as they plough through the thin atmosphere.
And Opportunity has been travelling back along the line of its lander’s approach. It has photographed discarded bits and pieces before.
This photo is just the latest in a long list of odd objects that have caused excited viewers to fall foul of the phenomenon of pareidolia.
Essentially, they’re seeing what they want to see because of the way the human mind always tries to find familiar patterns among odd shapes.
Such as rabbits in clouds.
Or secret Nazi moon bases.
Or faces on Mars.
Or Martian hieroglyphs.
Or itsy, bitsy, incy wincy tiny alien spacecraft.
BELIEVE IT! https://jandeane81.com/images/smilies/abduct2.gif OR NOT!
Source: http://www.news.com.au/technology/science/space/mars-opportunity-rover-photo-of-metallic-object-has-internet-in-a-ufo-frenzy/news-story/6f408160ed78c0bc6d720df274f4b4f1
http://yoursmiles.org/csmile/friend/c0416.gifpeace...
to be a chunk of metal photographed by the Opportunity Rover has
UFO buffs in a spin.
http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/6e1c76b85dd71bc1f850364879160979
Composite image of the Mars Opportunity rover overlooking a canyon on Mars.
The high contrast infra-red image, published by the Mars Exploratino Rover Mission (Opportunity: Panoramic Camera: Sol 348) was uploaded by the Opportunity Rover on March 17.
It shows an unusually shiny, and jagged, object sitting neatly on top of the grainy surface of Mars’ Meridiani Planum.
It has internet chat forum Reddit in rapture.
http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/02115b9f22347bef6ae8582b1ec4e835
Image of a strange, metallic looking object from the Mars Opportunity rover.
“Uh NASA? UFO Caught on Mars Rover Mission? Is this real?” posted Prosaic Origin.
If it looks odd, of course it must be aliens!
But at least in this case the resolution is reasonably crisp. Not a blurry morass like most UFO ‘evidence’.
“Looks like light glimmering off of a genuine spaceship on an alien planet in outer space,” one commentator noted.
But, for that to be true, there’s the small matter of scale. At that distance from the Opportunity Rover, any inhabitants would probably have to be no larger than ants.
A more down to Earth (though admittedly this is Mars we’re talking about here) suggestion was that it could be a piece of debris from the rover itself, or a heat shield from the craft that delivered it.
Earthly trash is increasingly common on the Red Planet, especially after a string of mission failures in recent decades. Satellites have gone awry. Landers have crashed.
http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/e7ab67c3314b3ac4cf9aecf0f08bc875
Debris from the Mars Opportunity Rover's lander vehicle litters the
Martian landscape.
But even successful projects litter the landscape with debris as they plough through the thin atmosphere.
And Opportunity has been travelling back along the line of its lander’s approach. It has photographed discarded bits and pieces before.
This photo is just the latest in a long list of odd objects that have caused excited viewers to fall foul of the phenomenon of pareidolia.
Essentially, they’re seeing what they want to see because of the way the human mind always tries to find familiar patterns among odd shapes.
Such as rabbits in clouds.
Or secret Nazi moon bases.
Or faces on Mars.
Or Martian hieroglyphs.
Or itsy, bitsy, incy wincy tiny alien spacecraft.
BELIEVE IT! https://jandeane81.com/images/smilies/abduct2.gif OR NOT!
Source: http://www.news.com.au/technology/science/space/mars-opportunity-rover-photo-of-metallic-object-has-internet-in-a-ufo-frenzy/news-story/6f408160ed78c0bc6d720df274f4b4f1
http://yoursmiles.org/csmile/friend/c0416.gifpeace...