To someone who has read the book of fiction, The Martian, or seen its movie version, a Martian storm seems rather terrifying. As the astronaut’s equipment goes flying in the wind, it injures him badly. His camp gets damaged too. In reality, are the winds on Mars that powerful? There are two things you should know.
One, because of its low gravitational pull – amounting to just one-third that on the Earth – Mars has a much thinner atmosphere. It is hardly one-hundredth as dense as the Earth’s atmosphere! That means, to move anything around, Martian winds have to blow very fast.
Two, winds on Mars generally blow at a speed of 16 to 32 kilometres per hour. This is influenced by many factors, such as temperature variations, atmospheric circulation patterns (large-scale movement of air by which heat is redistributed across the planet), and landscape. Often winds gather enough speed to sweep up Mars’ fine red dust and become dust storms. Some are intense enough to be spotted through telescopes here on the Earth! Moderately big dust storms, covering continent-size areas, occur annually. But once every few years, they grow really massive and blow across the entire planet, blanketing it in dust for weeks. Even so, maximum wind speeds on Mars are only about 100 kilometres per hour!
Picture Credit : Google
