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Verona Rupes: Tallest Known Cliff in the Solar System


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Verona Rupes: Tallest Known Cliff in the Solar System


Explanation:
Could you survive a jump off the tallest cliff in the Solar System?

Quite possibly.

Verona Rupes on
Uranus' moon
Miranda
is estimated to be 20 kilometers deep -- ten times the depth of the
Earth's Grand Canyon.


Given
Miranda's low gravity,
it would take about 12 minutes for a thrill-seeking
adventurer
to fall from the top, reaching the bottom at the speed of a
racecar --
about 200 kilometers per hour.

Even so, the fall might be survivable given proper
airbag protection.

The above image
of Verona Rupes was captured by the passing
Voyager 2 robotic spacecraft in 1986.

How the giant cliff was created remains unknown, but is possibly related to a
large impact or
tectonic surface motion.




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