The cluster of impact craters in this image formed in fractured terrain in Utopia Planitia, located in the northern lowlands of Mars.

These fractures form polygonal patterns suggesting that the subsurface was probably ice-rich and underwent numerous cycles of seasonal freeze-thaw processes. The crater cluster is approximately 5 kilometers across and probably formed when the impacting body (e.g., meteoroid) started to break up as it passed through Mars’ atmosphere.

The largest crater is about 1.4 kilometers in diameter and exhibits concentric fractures, numerous radial lineations, and small mounds along its interior slopes. These characteristics, in addition to the flow features visible in the large fractures or troughs, suggest a complicated local paleoclimatic history, involving subsurface ice melting and sublimation (when ice changes directly into vapor form) processes.

ID: ESP_064731_2180
date: 18 May 2020
altitude: 296 km

https://uahirise.org/hipod/ESP_064731_2180
NASA/JPL-Caltech/UArizona
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