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posted by martyb on Thursday November 12 2015, @08:50PM   Printer-friendly
from the time-and-tide-waits-for-no-man dept.

Orbiting a mere 3,700 miles (6,000 kilometers) above the surface of Mars, Phobos is closer to its planet than any other moon in the solar system. Mars' gravity is drawing in Phobos, the larger of its two moons, by about 6.6 feet (2 meters) every hundred years. Scientists expect the moon to be pulled apart in 30 to 50 million years.
...
Phobos' grooves were long thought to be fractures caused by the impact that formed Stickney crater. That collision was so powerful, it came close to shattering Phobos. However, scientists eventually determined that the grooves don't radiate outward from the crater itself but from a focal point nearby.

More recently, researchers have proposed that the grooves may instead be produced by many smaller impacts of material ejected from Mars. But new modeling by Hurford and colleagues supports the view that the grooves are more like "stretch marks" that occur when Phobos gets deformed by tidal forces.

Alas, far too long to prevent the base being overrun.


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  • (Score: 1) by Cornwallis on Thursday November 12 2015, @09:14PM

    by Cornwallis (359) on Thursday November 12 2015, @09:14PM (#262366)

    It *could* happen tomorrow.

  • (Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 12 2015, @10:56PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 12 2015, @10:56PM (#262397)
    Highly doubtful it will happen tomorrow, unless something completely unexpected happens (e.g. a bolide hits it from somewhere). Like everything in the Solar System Phobos obeys the inexorable laws of orbital mechanics and gravity will do what it does in its own time.