This page is designed to give you, the web surfer, an appreciation of the weather conditions that exist on Mars. This page is broken into several sections. Each section deals with a specific Martian climatic control.
First a few words about about Mars in general. Mars has a mass of 6.419 octillion kilograms (6419 with 24 zeros after it). This is much less than Earth's 59.736 octillion kilograms. The volume Mars occupies in space is 163.18 trillion cubic kilometers. By comparison, Earth occupies 1.08321 quadrillion cubic kilometers. The polar radius of Mars is 3375 kilometers (Earth's is 6356 kilometers). Mars' mean density is 3933 kg/m3 while Earth's is 5520 kg/m3. Surface gravity on Mars is 3.98 m/s2 while Earth's is the familliar 9.78 m/s2.
The Martian atmostphere is quite different from the atmosphere on Earth. The surface pressure is 6.1 mb +/- 3 mb and has a surface density of 0.020 kg/m3. On average, the Martian atmosphere has a height of 11.1 km. Average temperature on the Martian surface is 210 K. Diurnal temperature range is from 184 K to 242 K . Wind speeds can range from 2-7 m/s in the summer, 5-10 m/s in the fall, and 17-30 m/s in a Martian dust storm. Major atmospheric components include carbon dioxide-- 95.32%, nitrogen-- 2.7%, argon-- 1.6%, oxygen-- 0.13%, carbon monoxide-- 0.08%.
Climatic Controls of Martian Weather
Latitude
Altitude
Pressure and Winds
Daily
Martian Weather Report
Mars
(NASA)
Mars
Introduction
By G. Alex Sill
Emporia State University
Earth Science Dept.
In partial fullfillments of Meteorolgy, ES 319.
Richard Sleezer, Asst. Prof.
December 15, 1998
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Feel free to email me with questions or comments:
sillgeor@esuvm.emporia.edu
