It is considered the least terrestrial place on Earth: squeezed between some of the highest mountains in the world and where it may not rain even for years. It is the Atacama desert, probably the oldest desert on the planet and which, due to its ‘non-terrestrial’ characteristics, is the preferred site for testing space missions destined for Mars and hosting some of the largest telescopes in the world, such as those of the Southern European Observatory.
On the occasion of World Environment Day, e-Geos – a company that provides Earth Observation services and made up of Telespazio (80%) and the Italian Space Agency (20%) – wanted to select a spectacular satellite image taken from Landsat, in which it is possible to appreciate the incredible complexity of this territory characterized by deep valleys and pointed ridges, stretches of sand, salt lagoons, geysers and volcanoes.
The two very high mountain ranges that border Atacama to the east and west mean that the region does not receive even a drop of water. And it’s not a figure of speech: on average, 15 millimeters of water is recorded per year, but in some places it reaches just 1 millimeter per year. It may happen that not even a drop of water rains even for 4 years.
It is such a dry environment that on many peaks in the region, which even exceed 6,000 meters such as Ojos del Salado (the highest volcano in the world), there is no trace of snow. Precisely because of its non-terrestrial characteristics, some regions of the Atacama Desert are the favorite places to test space missions destined for Mars.
In 2003, some researchers wanted to replicate here some of the tests performed by the Viking 1 Viking 2 landers on Mars in the 1970s to find any traces of life: performed in Atacama they were unable to identify life forms. The Atacama Desert hosts many of the most important telescopes on the planet, such as the large interferometer Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array composed of 66 radio telescopes and the Very Large Telescope, while the gigantic Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) with a main mirror is under construction of 39 meters in diameter.
Source: Ansa
I am a journalist with over 6 years of experience working in the news industry. I currently work as an author for Global Happenings, and my coverage focuses on Technology news. I have written for various publications, including Reuters, The New York Times and The Guardian.
