Mars’s 1,000-mile cloud may depend on a process never directly observed in any planet’s atmosphere
During Martian spring and summer, a thin, extremely long cloud emerges every morning near the volcano Arsia Mons. It stretches over 1,000 miles—roughly the distance from New York to Kansas City as the crow flies—before dissipating, and the cycle repeats for months.
Researchers have modeled the cloud’s formation for the first time. Their results suggest it may be driven by a physical process that has never been directly observed in any planet’s atmosphere. That is the interesting part: the cloud is not merely large; its explanation may require an atmospheric process with no direct precedent.
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The model is the story here: it points to a process no one has directly watched in a planet’s atmosphere.
Or it points to a process that is simply hard to catch. “Never directly observed” is not the same as “does not happen.”