This site makes the argument, based on photographs from a NASA database and my own enlargements of those photographs,  that there is a large modern city on Mars.   An additional, and not necessarily mutually exclusive, argument I make is that some of the photographs in the NASA Mars Viking database appear to have been faked!  What is on Mars that NASA does not want us to see real photographs of?   The NASA database, known as the PDS Mars Explorer for the Armchair Astronaut, is open to the public via the Internet and offers advanced features whereby the user can navigate around Mars either by pointing/clicking his computer mouse or by entering coordinates for latitude and longitude.
    I have posted not only the NASA photographs but also my enlargements of portions of them which contain significant detail.  You can make your own judgment after you see these photographs.  To verify what you are seeing, I have also given links to the NASA database and a free downloadable graphics viewer so you can do the same kind of research that I have.
    After you have checked out the material on this site, I would appreciate it if you would participate in a poll asking your opinions about what you have seen.  The poll is entered from this site and you will be able to see the cumulative results of everyone's voting after you vote.

     In 1971 NASA launched the Mariner 9 mission which went by Mars and served as a pathfinder for the Viking Project.  The Viking Project, formally begun by NASA in 1968, was composed of two orbiters and two landers.  The stated goal was to determine whether any life existed in the red soil of Mars.  Viking Orbiter 1 took photographs of Mars as it orbited it 1120 times from June 19, 1976 through July 20, 1979 from heights ranging down to as low as 300 kilometers.  Viking Orbiter 2 took photographs of Mars as it orbited it 706 times from August 7, 1976 through July 25, 1978 from heights ranging down to as low as 300 kilometers.  Fifty thousand orbital images were taken on these Viking missions using two Vidicon cameras in each Orbiter.  Photographs from these Viking Orbiters were assembled by NASA into a database which was turned over to The United States Geologic Survey - Astrogeology Team for management.
    The photographs are mosaics, created by putting together the thousands of digital images taken by the two Viking Orbiters.  There are imperfections you may note where the images join.  They may not match up exactly- something like strips of patterned wallpaper that don't exactly match up.  Most objects in an area which show shadows will have the shadows on the same side.  If you see objects in the same area with shadows on different sides, that is probably due to the fact that the images for each were taken at different times of the day, either before or after noon.  Objects which appear flat may either be flat or may have been photographed near noon.  One good evidence of the reality of an apparent object is when it casts a shadow which corresponds with its shape.  Some shadows will give additional information about an object.  For example, an overhead view of a tiered, pyramid shaped object may present a square footprint.  The object's shadow, however, may reveal progressively smaller square tiers placed on the large base square.  Shadows on both sides of an object indicate the object is located in a depression or next to a hill.  You can usually figure out which shadow is from the object and which is cast by the surrounding ground.
    The advanced features on the web site allowed me to figure out the approximate size of objects at different settings for zoom in or zoom out.  For example, I created a custom map, zoomed in one step less than as far as possible, which showed the lake, river, and much of the city.  It was eight degrees wide in longitude (left longitude = -152.5 degrees west, right longitude = -160.5 degrees west) and also had an eight degree range in latitude (top latitude=  26.5 degrees north, bottom latitude= 18.5 degrees north).  The image size was 1024 rows by 1024 columns.  The program indicated the "Resolution = 128 pixels per degree = 0.54 kilometers per pixel = 0.25 miles per pixel."  I then noted exactly where the middle of the photograph was and printed a copy of the photograph which caught the left side and went beyond the middle point.  I measured from the left side, longitude -152.5 degrees west, to the mid point and found it was 5 and 1/4 inches.  So the entire eight degrees of longitude would be 10 and 1/2 inches wide.  Given that the resolution was 128 pixels per degree with 0.25 miles per pixel, you can calculate that each degree is 32 miles.  Given that the eight degree wide photograph was 10 and 1/2 inches wide, you can calculate that each inch equals 24.4 miles.  I measured the length of the lake on the photograph and found it was 3 and 1/2 inches long before it becomes a river.  Thus the lake is eighty five miles long.  The resolution figures are given for the equator so there would be some variance as you go away from the equator.  However, for our purposes, they provide a good approximation of size.
    I was frustrated with the limit of the zoom feature on the Mars Explorer database since I wanted to see things closer up.  I found a very good, free graphics viewer, Photonyx, which could take these Mars photographs and reduce or enlarge them by a factor of up to sixteen times.  Taking the most zoomed in photographs of this section of Mars and experimenting, I found that I could use Photonyx to enlarge up to an additional 400% and retrieve further detail before the photo quality was lost.  Some of these enlarged photographic sections are shown here.  They show much more detail about the downtown section of the city and provide good detail about the size, shape, and features of the buildings in the desert areas away from the city.  The enlargements also provide detail in support of the argument that at least some of the photographs have been faked by NASA.

            Discharging pipe and separate lake

            Lake to city overview

            Enlargement of building above the dam area

            City overview

            Downtown enlargement

            Buildings below city

            Buildings by the westerly "stitching line"

            A new south city area with its own downtown 
                - South city downtown enlargement

            Eastern suburb/outpost with cubic buildings 
                - Enlargement showing cubic buildings

            Evidence of photographic fakery using models 
                - overview showing both triangle and square
                - the triangle punched out of something like paper mache
                        - triangle enlarged 400%
                        - triangle at 200% plus nearby typewritten/printed number "4"
                - the square cut out of something like felt or foam
                        - square enlarged 300%
                        - square enlarged 400%
                - possible explanation for the "stitching lines" consistent with fakery
 

    http://www-pdsimage.wr.usgs.gov/PDS/public/mapmaker/mapmkr.htm is the URL for the PDS Mars Explorer.
    If you are not technically minded but could look at a flat map of Mars and point and click your mouse cursor, go to http://www-pdsimage.wr.usgs.gov/PDS/public/mapmaker and click on the word "Elysium."  It is on the far right side of the map.  Then manuever around the Elysium area by the directional arrows and zoom in when you see something interesting.  The Elysium area is where everything on this site is found.
    If you are technically minded and like to tweak the custom map controls, go to this URL:
http://www-pdsimage.wr.usgs.gov/PDS/public/explorer/html/marsadvc.htm  Once there, enter your choices for various categories.  Use the black and white Mars data set since it goes down to a finer degree of resolution than the other choices.  The other important choices to make are the longitude and latitude.  Longitude and latitude settings for the images on this site are approximately as follows:
           pipe discharging water= latitude of 26.6 degrees, longitude of 209.1 degrees
           lake, river, western end of city = latitude of 22.5 degrees, longitude of -156.5 degrees
                                    Note:  the above could also be expressed as longitude of  203.5 degrees
           overview of the city= latitude of 24.0 degrees, longitude of 199.0 degrees
           downtown, western end of the city= latitude of 24.0 degrees, longitude of 201.0 degrees
           south city area= bounded by latitudes of 18 to 22 degrees, longitudes of 199 to 203 degrees
           triangle, square, and number "4"= bounded by latitudes of 24 to 28 degrees, longitudes of 193 to 197 degrees
           cubic buildings and square= bounded by latitudes of 22 to 26 degrees, longitudes of 193 to 197 degrees

    Sometimes, especially during the weekends, the site is taken partly off line and you can't get to the images.  This is probably for file maintenance.  If this happens to you, try again another day.  On one occasion the search engines were "de-tuned" so they were online but gave out super small or darkened images.  They were returned to normal operation the next day. 

.....

    This city on Mars seems to have developed in a manner similar to the development of civilization on Earth.  On Earth cities sprang up where water was abundant, either on the coastal areas or next to lakes and rivers.  An 85 mile long lake can provide plenty of water for city dwellers on Mars.  On Earth man learned how to create dams on rivers to control and stockpile water.  The water going from the lake to the river may enter a dam as it nears the western edge of the city on Mars.  (Or I concede the dam may be an artifact of the mosaic process.)  One detail supporting the dam hypothesis is that there appears to be a discolored oval area surrounding the dam area, possible evidence of a basin area filled in when the dam overflows its banks.
    I feel the evidence is overwhelming that what is depicted in these photographs and enlargements shows intelligent design and not random flukes of nature.  The water gushing out of the pipe or trenches shows no natural formation but appears to be the harnessing of an underground source.  The close ups of the downtown area show a street system, along with buildings and possible vegetation, that is very similar to what Landsat images show for the Washington, DC area, for example.  The three separate segments of dotted lines going up vertically from horizontal segment of the city do not occur in nature.  They are the same distance apart also.  The fact that the city segments, vertical or horizontal, are rectangular does not coincide with a random act of nature.  The close ups of buildings in the desert near the city or close to the dotted lines show great detail as to shape- shapes which do not occur in nature.  The shadows associated with these buildings indicate they may be multi-story and have sharp angles which would not be expected in nature since the elements of nature would tend to round off the surfaces.
    In my view the photographs show a modern city on Mars or they are the product of an elaborate hoax.  I don't think NASA would admit countenancing a hoax since it would hurt their professional reputations and make Congress question their use of taxpayer funds.  I also find it hard to believe that NASA would overlook this treasure trove of photographic evidence about a modern city on Mars.  This leaves me with a limited number of likely explanations for what I have found:  1) NASA wants to condition the American public to the idea of extraterrestrial life.  It has been doing so over the years in a slow, gradual way, e.g. water on the Moon, water at the Martian poles, water on Europa, meteors on Earth from Mars with evidence of bacterial life inside them, etc.  Let some researcher like me stumble upon the city on Mars via the now open public database.  If society accepts the fact of intelligent life on Mars, proceed with more revelations that NASA has hidden for years.  If society is not ready for this Mars revelation, deny its validity and blame it on some prankster from the United States Geological Survey.  2)  Some NASA employee who knows about the evidence of intelligent life on Mars is a renegade who believes the public has a right to know and made sure that some of  the relevant information was placed in the Mars Explorer database in hopes that someone would discover it.  As between explanations one and two,  I would place a bet on explanation number one above if I was a gambler.  However, there is a third possibility, that of an elaborate hoax by NASA.  3) As shown by the section above on evidence for a photographic hoax, there is a strong possibility that at least some of the evidence of intelligent design in these photographs may have come from NASA hoaxers.  Assuming that NASA has indeed sent missions to Mars that have produced useful data, why would NASA not want to share this data with the public?  The only thing I can think of is that NASA has evidence of an advanced civilization more impressive and definitive than the evidence I have referred to here.  Maybe NASA feels the public is not yet ready for incontrovertible truth or fears that existing governmental and economic power structures would quickly crumble.

You can e-mail me at etaoinsh@pacbell.net with your comments.

Copyright 1999
by Mark Commerford