Pavonis Mons

Pavonis Mons is the middle of three volcanos (collectively known as Tharsis Montes) on the Tharsis bulge near the equator of the planet Mars. To its north is Ascraeus Mons, and to its south is Arsia Mons. The largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons, is to its northwest.

Pavonis Mons stands at about seven km above the surrounding plain. By comparison, the highest mountain on Earth, Mount Everest, stands about 8.85 km above sea level. To its lower east flank, there is a chain of elliptical, or oval-shaped, pits, lined up down the center of a shallow trough. They were both formed by collapse associated by faulting – the scarp on each side of the trough is a fault line. (Such features are normally found when the ground is moved by molten rock or tectonic forces.)

In fiction

Because of its position on the Martian equator, Pavonis Mons has been used by fiction authors as a likely site for a future space elevator on the planet. This appears in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy (in which Pavonis is also the site of the Martian capital city, Sheffield), and in the GURPS Transhuman Space roleplaying game source book about Mars, In the Well (in which the elevator is called 'Beanstalk', and is linked to the moon Deimos).[1]

In music

• The instrumental, "Approaching Pavonis Mons by Balloon (Utopia Planitia)" is the last song from The Flaming Lips' album Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.

See also

• List of mountains on Mars by height