Traces of water, volcanism, tectonics and impacts around Caralis Chaos
Traces of water, volcanism, tectonics and impacts around Caralis Chaos
For orientation, the geological structures described here are shown in a 'vertical plan' view. From south to north (or left to right): the southern tectonic rift valley of the Sirenum Fossae; various wrinkle ridges, which were pushed up during the movement of still malleable lava and mark the 'flow fronts' of lava flows; gullies at the upper rim of a crater almost ten kilometres in size, which were probably formed from instability in a layer of ice and dust after the evaporation of carbon dioxide ice; flow structures on the southern, outer crater rim of the prominent, approximately 30-kilometre-wide crater; small valleys on the ridge east of and below the crater; 'knobby', light-coloured and chaotically-distributed hills; the northern segment of the Sirenum Fossae rift valley, with an overall length of over 2000 kilometres; a strikingly smooth plateau several hundred metres high.
