After the Martian Apocalypse

by Mac Tonnies

  The unexplained “roads” on Phobos bear a tantalizing resemblance to the mass launchers of O’Neill and Clarke. Crater Stickney, gaping and almost impossibly large, may be the remains of an excavation used to eject mass into space. And its shadows may conceal an opening into the interior ecosphere—assuming, of course, there is one.

  While this may come across as unfettered speculation, the scenario is justified by apparently nonrandom formations on the Martian surface. If there were intelligent Martians, where did they come from? If Mars suffered an early planet-wide holocaust, an indigenous intelligent civilization is precluded. If the formations in Cydonia are the product of intelligent design, searching the solar neighborhood for evidence of an interstellar vehicle is a logical undertaking. Phobos may prove to be a literal spacecraft of gargantuan proportions.

  Independent Mars researcher Efrain Palermo undertook a comprehensive survey of Phobos by examining Viking photos and discovered a number of unexpected formations. Phobos is a small, rounded body, so Palermo was intrigued to note various “cones” rising high above the moon’s surface, casting telltale elongated shadows. He subsequently amassed a veritable portfolio of unusual cones. But his most interesting discovery was a tall formation he dubbed the “monolith.”

  Lan Fleming, an imaging subcontractor at Johnson Space Center, took a careful look at the monolith, taking into account resolution and sun angle. While the feature’s exact shape seemed elusive, he concluded that the monolith itself was quite real and not one of NASA’s “tricks of light.”

  The Phobos “Monolith” is an unexplained formation that rises high above the moonlet’s horizon. Image courtesy NASA, extrapolation by Efrain Palermo. Bottom: When processed with shape-from-shading rendering software, the seemingly columnar Monolith takes on an intriguing pyramidal morphology. Image courtesy Chris Joseph.

  Later photoclinometric (shape-from-shading) analysis by graphic designer Chris Joseph strongly suggested that the monolith was pyramidal, unlike its rectangular namesake from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

  While faceted formations such as Palermo’s monolith can (and have) been formed by dynamic forces on planetary surfaces, Phobos is perhaps the last place in the solar system where one would expect to find such an anomaly. Phobos is airless and waterless, with no erosion in evidence except meteoric cratering.

  The monolith’s conspicuous elevation and angled shape are doubly difficult to account for if it’s a natural feature. Perhaps it’s a chunk of impact ejecta that somehow failed to achieve escape velocity. But this accounts for neither the engaging pyramidal shape nor the lack of other such formations in the vicinity. If artificial, the monolith could be the edge of an internal faceted structure or even an observatory from which to observe the disk of Mars.

  Or the formation may be part of some long abandoned air traffic control system. If the Martians were a spacefaring civilization, it’s plausible that they managed their space-based industry from orbit, rather than constantly shuttling materials and astronauts out of Mars’s formidable gravity well.

  Already, our own space-based hardware is assembled and repaired from “on the spot” platforms, such as the Space Shuttle (which is, in essence, a very temporary space station). The Martian moons, speedily traversing the planet, could have served as convenient space stations. If Phobos is indeed a derelict spacecraft, then it’s likely it would have been cannibalized for parts as the Martian civilization set about making the planet their home. Future explorers from Earth may find its interior to be a plundered tomb the size of a world.

  Although Richard Hoagland rejects the “Phobos-As-Spacecraft Hypothesis,” he addresses Phobos in The Monuments of Mars, citing former astronaut Brian O’Leary’s suggestion that future manned missions to Mars utilize the Martian moon as a staging base. Phobos is thought to contain abundant water ice, in which case a preemptive mission to Phobos could set to work manufacturing fuel for the voyage back to Earth.

  This agenda foreshadows Mars exploration activist Robert Zubrin’s Mars Direct plan, in which an economical but relatively low-tech Mars mission could be launched within ten years, using indigenous water to fuel the Earth-return vehicle. The recent discovery of subsurface ice on Mars underscores Zubrin’s mission strategy.

  We know far too little about our ancient neighbors to surmise if they were capable of space flight. If they did arrive from another star following some centuries-long voyage, perhaps they reverted to a less sophisticated level once on Mars. The environmental rigors of interstellar flight would not have applied on a green, expansive world (assuming Mars was still green when it was colonized). It could have been all-too-enticing to shrug off the claustrophobic legacy of decades in favor of an agrarian existence.

  In either case, there are features on Mars that tend to support the existence of at least one high-tech culture. One of these is the so-called Runway atop the extinct volcano Hecates Tholus. On first take, the Runway looks like an unremarkable (if out of place) ruler-straight line. Close inspection reveals that the line is composed of multiple indistinct objects. Fittingly, the Runway has been rechristened the “String of Pearls,” although the shapes appear more like shallow mounds than spheres.

  Unlike most of the monikers used to identify anomalous formations on Mars, the Runway may have been a literal runway. Its constituent bumps suggest an electromagnetic accelerator of some kind, possibly a variation of the proposed “rail-guns” on Phobos. The Runway’s placement is ideal for launching payloads into space. By taking advantage of the volcano’s height, the Martians would have minimized energy expenditure.

  Speculative pro-space writers such as Marshall Savage have envisioned nearly identical set-ups for flinging cargo (and human passengers) into space. It’s tempting to wonder if the Martians didn’t use the Hecates Runway to shuttle astronauts to and from bases on Phobos and Deimos.

  If Phobos once served as an interstellar craft, it was probably left in Mars’s orbit to serve as a research platform or habitat. The original Martian colonists could have shuttled down to Mars’s surface in separate, smaller craft. In this scenario, the Runway was probably built in a later phase to facilitate the flow of material and personnel (for lack of a better term).

  Obviously, this portrait of Martians and their spacecraft is grounded on speculation. But the Runway is a concrete physical anomaly and appears well-preserved. Alternatively, it may turn out to be a geological freak, although accompanying oddities on Hecates Tholus suggest otherwise. While the central question—are there extraterrestrial artifacts on Mars?—remains, entertaining various speculative explanations in the event that there are does not constitute pseudoscience. The Mars anomaly community shares this attitude, more or less, although academics are typically less prone to speculation.

  Maybe this is an enigma that cannot be resolved without recourse to brainstorming. In my own hypothetical reconstructions, I’ve stuck to two principal tenets: (1) The Martians, assuming they exist, were living beings with the vulnerabilities that implies; and (2), The Martians were constrained by physical laws as we know them. This doesn’t exclude radical technologies; quantum physics and burgeoning computer power on Earth argue that a sufficiently advanced civilization would have exploited novel techniques.

  As Arthur C. Clarke is fond of reminding us, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

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  The Mounds

  While studying the various formations that comprise the City, Richard Hoagland’s attention was attracted to several small formations that seemed to be arranged in geometric order. His study of these features, labeled “Mounds,” was confined to low-resolution Viking imagery; thus little if anything could be said about the Mounds’ shape. Each feature constituted only a handful of pixels. While there was nothing inherently strange about the Mounds themselves, their apparent relationship to one another strongly suggested intelligent placement.

  Later, Society for Planetary SETI Research founder Stanley V. McDaniel colla
borated with theoretical physicist Horace Crater in a more detailed examination of the Mounds, establishing criteria for candidate Mound features and discovering other such conspicuous “dots” on the Cydonia desert. The resulting pattern revealed an extremely unlikely degree of mathematical redundancy, employing complex trigonometric functions apparently designed for viewing from above.

  This, of course, was consistent with previous findings in Cydonia, such as the upward-staring Face. Crater and McDaniel had discovered further quantifiable evidence that leaned toward artificiality as opposed to natural forces. Realizing the implications raised by the peculiar Mounds, Crater computerized the configuration found in Cydonia in an effort to determine the chances of it occurring naturally.

  The verdict was unshakable: the Mound configuration was deliberate beyond reasonable doubt. Like Carlotto’s discovery that the Face possessed a non-fractal terrain signature, the discovery of a mathematically testable arrangement of features on Mars fueled the efforts of scientists accused of merely “seeing faces.” The Mounds helped move the Cydonia inquiry out of the realm of subjective impression and into the mathematical arena.

  Mound P seen in high-resolution in 2001, accompanied by a curious hexagonal-shaped symmetrical structure. Courtesy of NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory/California Institute of Technology/Malin Space Science Systems.

  But confirmation of the “Mound Artificiality Hypothesis” had to await high-resolution photography by a suitably equipped probe. After the sudden loss of the Mars Observer in 1992, which devastated mainstream Mars researchers and anomalists alike, Crater and McDaniel waited for images from the Mars Global Surveyor, which snapped its first infamous shot of the Face in April of 1998.

  MGS images of the various Mounds failed to elicit a consensus reaction, though whatever the Mounds are they are not amorphic piles of rock. By themselves, the Mounds are no smoking gun. But several are highly unusual and certainly consistent with artificial origin. Mound P is probably the most artificial-looking, with bisymmetric structure, a curiously elongated shape reminiscent of a terrestrial megalith (or bomb bunker), and a clear-cut triangular edge. The feature’s sides are flanked by a highly eroded elevated platform of some kind.

  Remarkably enough, the MGS revealed that Mound P was not an isolated anomaly. To the Mound’s immediate east is a most unusual hexagonal “pedestal” with strange bright lines running across its surface. If this is the result of erosion, the effect is most unusual, and the hexagon’s proximity to the highly geometric Mound P seems extraordinarily suspicious. But there is more.

  Next to the elevated hexagon, mistakenly termed a “crater” by some investigators, is a highly angular, partially buried feature that defies geological comparison. It looks something like a partially crumpled beer can, with sharp edges poking through the sand. Unlike other features in Cydonia, there is no trace of erosion—possibly because there’s nothing left to erode: the bizarre feature is reminiscent of a heap of structural girders left from the collapse of a rectangular building.

  Most unusual, all three of the morphologies that conspire to form Mound P are enclosed in a shallow semicircular depression. The depression, or basin, is extremely faint; if it’s the eroded rim of an ancient crater, which is doubtful, Mound P evidently formed after the impact. But how? Perhaps it’s more likely that the basin, like the Mound itself, is the remnant of an archaeological site.

  The second-most compelling Mound was labeled “E” in the Crater/McDaniel study. Together with the so-called City Square—a collection of small features in the precise center of the City complex—Mounds P and E form an equilateral triangle—one of the first clues that the Mound configuration may be more than the sum of its parts.

  Mound E, like the vastly larger City Pyramid and D&M Pyramid, possesses a distinct pyramidal shape. And like Mound P, it’s not alone. Mound E comprises one corner of a shallow, partially buried square platform. On an adjacent corner of the platform is another pyramidal outcropping, although the precise shape seems simpler, perhaps tetrahedral. Accumulated dust hugs the tetrahedron’s sides from both edges, obscuring the underlying platform and giving the site an eerily Egyptian appearance.

  On seeing the suggestions of geometric structure emerging from the ground, one wishes to mount an archaeological dig, exposing the platform to daylight in what might be the first time in millennia. What was the function of the Mounds? To broadcast an esoteric mathematical message to travelers from Earth? If so, why commit the message to a scattering of relatively small formations that would quickly degrade into near-invisibility? Maybe by adding multiple structural elements to each Mound, the Martians helped insure that the Mounds would survive with their sophisticated message intact. Deliberately building Mound E on top of a square platform would have contributed to its oddity, and thus its potential to attract onlookers. Of course, this is assuming that the Mounds are meant for human eyes.

  Crater soon realized that the triangular bulk of Mound E appeared suspiciously five-sided; this geometry is reproduced, on a larger scale, in both the City and D&M Pyramids. Since Mound E is relatively tiny (about the size of one of the Pyramids in Egypt), it’s unlikely that natural processes (e.g., wind faceting) sculpted all three features. Three different natural processes capable of producing five-sided surface formations need to be invoked if debunkers are to maintain the null hypothesis, which holds that the Martian enigmas are natural.

  The “City Square” is a small configuration of four highly degraded mounds at the lateral center of the City. Courtesy of NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory/California Institute of Technology/Malin Space Science Systems.

  The highly conspicuous presence of three five-sided pyramidal formations, each of varying size, implies a non-natural explanation. Furthermore, the Mounds’ relationship with one another adds another level of anomaly. Compound Mound E’s strange proportions with other enigmas in the immediate vicinity and the specter of intelligence becomes almost palpable.

  But is the Mounds’ proposed relationship meaningful? The City Square, originally identified by Hoagland, may hold clues.

  In The Monuments of Mars, Hoagland refers to the City Square as a cluster of five small features arranged like “crosshairs” in the City’s lateral center. The Surveyor, to the disappointment of many, revealed that the fifth, central formation in the alleged crosshairs formation was nonexistent. Apparently, it had been an artifact created by the Viking camera’s low resolution. Critics who cite Lowell’s illusory canals are keen to point out that the entirety of the Cydonia controversy rests on the issue of insufficient resolution. While this argument is not without merit, it has lost much of its back-bone since the Surveyor’s highly successful re-imaging of central anomalies.

  Equally disconcerting is the impression that one of the existing features had managed to rotate ninety degrees since 1976; while some attribute this to an active presence in Cydonia, or trickery on behalf of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, it’s more likely this is a genuine trick of light.

  The four features that make up the City Square are disappointingly shallow and undefined, although one is noticeably rectilinear and not unlike Mound P in its basic shape. Of special interest are features at the limits of the Surveyor’s resolution. A perfect triangular enclosure visible in the MGS’ first shot of the City Square remains visible in its second, somewhat more detailed view, demonstrating that it was not an imaging artifact. Such relatively minuscule detail is inconsistent with eroded lumps of rock, but makes sense when viewed as structural decay.

  The City Square, whatever it is, was very likely an important component of the Cydonia complex’s layout. As noted by Hoagland, a viewer standing in the center of the Square would look past the nearby City Pyramid and Fort to see the Face gazing into the sky. Is it mere coincidence that this same location fits into a redundant mathematical scheme encoded by additional, widely separated anomalies?

  The features in Cydonia are challenging because they present multiple levels of strangeness, some quantifi
ably unusual and others visually provocative. If the Mounds are natural features, we would expect them to be indistinguishable from the many other small-scale formations that cover Mars’s surface. Instead, we see blatant evidence of geometry. While geometric formations can be formed by a variety of natural processes, the examples at the center of the controversy exhibit redundant strangeness.

  Mound P, for example, is a virtual complex of radically dissimilar shapes. The odds for each anomaly appearing next door to one another are dismally low, especially when Crater and McDaniel’s a priori prediction is taken into account. If the Mounds are artificial, it will be interesting to know in what ways mathematical consistency hinges on utilitarian design.

  On Earth, the only astronomical markers are ancient, redolent with a sense of timelessness. In Cydonia, the mathematically integrated Mounds coexist with arcologies of vertiginous height—perhaps literal mountains equipped to sustain life. Are the trigonmetric functions embedded in the Mounds the raison d’etre behind the Cydonia complex, or are they merely an obtuse form of landscape decoration? Impartial aliens observing our own suburban rock gardens and decorative statuary may be similarly perplexed.

  Inevitably, critics of the Artificiality Hypothesis have dismissed tantalizing evidence such as the Mounds because they see no obvious correspondence with terrestrial architecture. Mike Malin, the MGS camera operator, flaunted his own anthropomorphic bias when he declared that he would believe the Face and City were artificial only if he saw “lawn chairs.” It’s obvious he was joking. But on a critical level, his comment betrays the rampant terrestrial chauvinism that has kept disciplined planetary SETI confined to the scientific fringe.

  The sheer decrepitude of the Cydonia monuments makes testing for artificiality a uniquely frustrating (if fascinatingly novel) exercise. On Earth, the Giza Necropolis and Great Pyramids epitomize antiquity, and what we know of their cultural meaning has been inferred from exhaustive on-site examination. The anomalies in Cydonia, thought to predate the Egyptian monoliths by hundreds of thousands of years, deserve the same methodical approach. But before such a venture can be entertained, Cydonia researchers find themselves with the burden of proof projected onto their collective shoulders.