NASA Insight sees cloudy days on Mars, so why does it never rain?

Watching the passing Martian clouds is apparently a good way to pass the time if you are a NASA robot hanging out on the surface of the red planet, looking out for Marsquakes and pound the buried rocks.

The Mars Insight Landing has returned the photo above from its perch in the Elysium Planitia plains, showing drifting clouds at sunset on April 25th.

We think Mars is mostly cold, dead and dry, but we've all learned that clouds are water vapor – the water vapor that eventually falls to the surface as rain or water. snow. And yet, there is nothing on Mars, so what gives here?

"In reality, there is more water vapor in the Martian atmosphere than in the upper layers of the earth 's atmosphere," said Armin Kleinboehl of NASA in 2013.

The clouds on Mars are probably water ice, like the thin ice fog and haze that can form on very cold days without ever rushing. While the lean atmosphere of the red planet and the freezing cold prevent these frozen clouds from falling into the form of rain and snow that we see here on Earth, there is actually a kind of precipitation on Mars.

"This precipitation is very likely in the form of frost," says NASA. "The soil will probably be colder than the air (especially cold, clear nights), and the air that strikes it cools and the water freezes to the ground in the form of frost. a Mars lander in the 1970s) went off some mornings. "

Cloudy nights and frosty mornings on Mars; All the more reason to build a new base on the red planet in order to set up a Starbucks. Such conditions require a hot latte!