Query: Mars/Mountains

Gene Godbold (ansclm@med.unc.edu)
Tue, 13 Aug 96 21:06:26 EDT

Greetings,

I'd like to ask a question of the geology braintrust. A while ago there
was a very informative post, perhaps by Mr. Morton, on why mountains on
Earth cannot be higher than some height (perhaps 6 miles?). But these
conditions can't apply to Mars, which has Olympus Mons at 8 miles high or
thereabouts. How come Mars can have higher mountains? Does it have
something to do with the red planet having a solid core?

Also, is there any limit to how deep an ocean trench might be?

Gene Godbold