TY - JOUR
T1 - The Tsiolkovskiy crater landslide, the moon
T2 - An LROC view
AU - Boyce, Joseph M.
AU - Mouginis-Mark, Peter
AU - Robinson, Mark
N1 - Funding Information:
Thanks to Nadine Barlow for her thoughtful and insightful evaluation of this manuscript. Her efforts are greatly appreciated and have made this a better contribution. This work was supported under a NASA GSFC/ASU LROC contract. PMM was supported by NASA Grant 80NSSC17K0307 .
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Elsevier Inc.
PY - 2020/2
Y1 - 2020/2
N2 - Evidence suggests that the lobate flow feature that extends ~72 km outward from the western rim of Tsiolkovskiy crater is a long runout landslide. This landslide exhibits three (possibly four) morphologically different parts, likely caused by local conditions. All of these, plus the ejecta of Tsiolkovskiy crater, and its mare fill are approximately of the same crater model age, i.e., ~3.55 ± 0.1 Ga. The enormous size of this landslide is unique on the Moon and is a result of a combination of several geometric factors (e.g., its location relative to Fermi crater), and that Tsiolkovskiy crater was an oblique impact that produced an ejecta forbidden zone on its western side (Schultz, 1976). The landslide formed in this ejecta free zone as the rim of Tsiolkovskiy collapsed and its debris flowed across the relatively smooth, flat floor of Fermi crater. In this location, it could be easily identified as a landslide and not ejecta. Its mobility and coefficient of friction are similar to landslides in Valles Marineris on Mars, but less than wet or even dry terrestrial natural flows. This suggests that the Mars landslides may have been emplaced dry. The high density of small craters on the landslide is likely an illusion caused by the effects of age related differences in regolith thickness on crater morphology, and the presence of the abundant young, circular secondary craters produce by debris ejected from distant fresh craters.
AB - Evidence suggests that the lobate flow feature that extends ~72 km outward from the western rim of Tsiolkovskiy crater is a long runout landslide. This landslide exhibits three (possibly four) morphologically different parts, likely caused by local conditions. All of these, plus the ejecta of Tsiolkovskiy crater, and its mare fill are approximately of the same crater model age, i.e., ~3.55 ± 0.1 Ga. The enormous size of this landslide is unique on the Moon and is a result of a combination of several geometric factors (e.g., its location relative to Fermi crater), and that Tsiolkovskiy crater was an oblique impact that produced an ejecta forbidden zone on its western side (Schultz, 1976). The landslide formed in this ejecta free zone as the rim of Tsiolkovskiy collapsed and its debris flowed across the relatively smooth, flat floor of Fermi crater. In this location, it could be easily identified as a landslide and not ejecta. Its mobility and coefficient of friction are similar to landslides in Valles Marineris on Mars, but less than wet or even dry terrestrial natural flows. This suggests that the Mars landslides may have been emplaced dry. The high density of small craters on the landslide is likely an illusion caused by the effects of age related differences in regolith thickness on crater morphology, and the presence of the abundant young, circular secondary craters produce by debris ejected from distant fresh craters.
KW - Geological processes
KW - Impact processes
KW - Landslides
KW - Moon surface
KW - Terrestrial planets
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U2 - 10.1016/j.icarus.2019.113464
DO - 10.1016/j.icarus.2019.113464
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85074155185
SN - 0019-1035
VL - 337
JO - Icarus
JF - Icarus
M1 - 113464
ER -