Ceres’ mysterious mountain Ahuna Mons is seen in this mosaic of images from NASA’s Dawn spacecraft. On its steepest side, this mountain is about 3 miles (5 kilometers) high. Its average overall height is 2.5 miles (4 kilometers). The diameter of the mountain is about 12 miles (20 kilometers).
“There is nothing quite like Ahuna Mons in the solar system,” said Lucy McFadden of NASA Goddard, a co-author on the paper. “It’s the first cryovolcano we’ve seen that was produced by a brine and clay mix.”
So it's a unique object in the solar system, yet they have no problem identifying it as an ice volcano.
Rather than an ice volcano, I see an open excavation pit and right next to it a mountain of discarded debris. It even has the right type of flanks that you'd expect when piling mine tailings up really high... like what was it, some 4000 meters.
Why is it so difficult for us to accept that there may well be space-faring civilisations out there, with a technological level vastly superior to ours, mining both asteroids and planets...
To get a better look at the image, follow the (headline) link...