Endless wind

A Piece of Mars: This 2.88×1.13 km (1.79×0.70 mi) scene shows quintessential Mars, with a 670 m diameter impact crater heavily modified by wind erosion. Both the crater floor and the surrounding terrain are covered by what is likely loosely-cemented dust. The texture is that of wind-eroded materials, but to make this texture that material must be fine-grained and uniform in cementation (except where punctuated by craters that are, in turn, also wind-eroded). I’ve never seen a texture like that on Earth. Check out the whole HiRISE image to see how extensive that texture is (and note that I’ve only shown it at half-scale here!) – it’s the dominant feature of this landscape for many hundreds of kilometers. This is in Daedalia Planum, high terrain just southwest of the Tharsis Montes, where equatorial easterly winds might be enhanced by nighttime downslope winds coming down Arsia Mons, the southernmost of the three volcanos (HiRISE ESP_017651_1670, NASA/JPL/Univ. of Arizona)