A raw image from the Mast camera (Mastcam) onboard NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover, taken on 2022–08–07 at 20:58:23 UTC, displays a mysterious cylinder buried in the Martian regolith of the Paraitepuy Pass — a narrow gap in the Gale Crater situated on the slopes of Mount Sharp.
This puzzling object was discovered in NASA’s database by Rami Bar Ilan and brought to my attention by Dr. Jan Špaček — who studies signatures of life on Mars and Professor Carol Cleland — who studies anomalies from a philosophical perspective. The object was publicly discussed in detail by Brian Dobbs here. I wrote back to Jan and Carol that anomalies are best researched in the open with full disclosure of all available data, since such discussions might motivate scientists to collect additional data that would resolve their mystery.
The cylinder can be seen in multiple images from both the Mastcam left and Mastcam right high-definition color cameras at different focal distances within the NASA, JPL, and WUSTL repositories. Related data was documented by NASA here, by JPL here (3556MR1025170721700585C00_DRCL), and by WUSTL here (Sol 3556, object 713174794). The cylinder was imaged from various angles. It was identified in raw images of the Curiosity MSL notebook but was not featured on the public mission website at the time of its discovery.
The shiny object has a perfectly round cylindrical shape with a length of about 20 centimeters and a flat end. The most likely explanation is that it corresponds to human-made debris.
Objects found by rovers that appear artificial are typically identified as debris from the mission’s own landing system, such as parts of the Sky Crane or heat shield that may have been carried by winds or scattered during the rover’s descent in 2012. This particular anomalous cylinder could be a bit of wiring or wheel material from Curiosity itself. The rover has shed small pieces during its operations, and similar anomalies in past images have been traced back to mission hardware. The Curiosity rover is approximately the size of a small SUV, measuring roughly 3-meters-long, 2.8-meters-wide, and 2.2-meters-tall. It weighs nearly 899 kilogram and features a 2.1-meters-long robotic arm and wheels with a 50.8-centimeter diameter.
The Martian harsh environment can also shape rocks into unusual forms, like the “blueberries” (hematite spherules) or gypsum crystals seen elsewhere in Gale Crater.
NASA has not officially commented on this mysterious cylindrical object.
excerpt from Avi Loeb's article
Full article here:
by Shizzilx
17 Comments
Cant the rover just go pick it up and study it??
Devon Island drain pipe that was overlooked most likely
It’s all been done before.
That’s because there in Canada and it’s probably from a wind blowing trash from the camp
Wow already littering on mars
Couldn’t that just be space debris?
Following
It was found less than two km from a nearby crash site.
Martian cig butt?
Probably just a fiber optic cable ….
Incense cone?
I don’t know what it is, but I bet it already has micro plastics in its semen
Highway cone. Looks like someone knocked it over.
Here I am using paper straws.
Its really hard to tell the scaling if the rocks, but if this is an image of the ground up close, that’s probably a core drill core sample. Likely the top or bottom of a core broke off as the Rover was moving it, they usually come apart where two different compositions meet.(I used to install fence, i ran the core drill)
They actually were able to do some extensive chemical analysis of the cylinder and they found significant traces of peanut butter and microwaved banana.
We’ve sent 5 Rovers to Mars and over 20 satellites have crashed on that planet. Odds are it’s ours.