2024 August 5
Mars Opposition Blog 5 August 2024
This is a summary of observations up till July 31.
By early July a trace of bluish-white N. polar hood along the limb had been discernible for some time. It had never been prominent. Tomio Akutsu’s images of June 27-28 and Clyde Foster’s images of July 9-10 clearly show how some cloud had moved south to cover the N. end of Mare Acidalium, as is often the case. The hood will become very prominent over the next few months. A nice image of it was secured by Damian Peach on July 28.
O.Inoue on Jul 20 imaged an evening cloud at Arsia Mons at Ls = 297 deg. It was clearly confirmed by MacNeill’s work two days later. These may be the first images of it this apparition.
Indus continues to be easily visible. It is now quite clear that Sinus Gomer (at the northern edge of Mare Cimmerium) has faded greatly since 2022. This had been suspected some months ago, but we could not be certain with such a tiny disk diameter back then. See the July 28 image of Peach. I also suspect that Lunae Lacus may now be somewhat darker than it has been for some time. East of Syrtis Major there is a hint of the southern part of Nepenthes being weakly imaged, while to the north, Nodus Alcyonius remains small and weak compared with a decade ago. And Solis Lacus may be a little smaller, particularly in the N-S sense.
During July 27-29, imaging and visual observations from Japan revealed a small dust storm upon the western edge of Margaritifer Sinus, in the eastern part of Valles Marineris. See the July 28 image by Inoue. As of today it does not appear to be expanding, and is now fading out. This continues the trend of recent years with, Hellas less active in producing storms and Valles Marineris (upon the border of Chryse-Xanthe) exhibiting greater activity.
I am posting Foster’s image of July 10 here, plus others from Casely (June 23), Haigh (June 17), Inoue (July 28), Ito (July 6), Akutsu (June 27) and Peach (July 28).
At July 31 we are at Ls = 303 degrees. A large planet-encircling storm might yet commence within the next 10 degrees in Ls, so please keep watching intensively
Front page teaser: Another dust storm and some small albedo changes. Image by O Inoue
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