Surprising Further Evidence for a Wet Mars

Riding with Robots writes "When the robotic geologist Spirit found the latest evidence for a wet Mars, 'You could hear people gasp in astonishment,' said Steve Squyres, the lead scientist for the Mars rovers. 'This is a remarkable discovery. And the fact that we found something this new and different after nearly 1,200 days on Mars makes it even more remarkable. It makes you wonder what else is still out there.' The latest discovery, announced today, adds compelling new evidence for ancient conditions that might have been favorable for life, according to the rover team."

Mars, you're so wet.

[Anonymous Coward]

Baby, we're coming. Oh yes.

Re:Looks like ...

[Opportunist]

It does, you just have to alter its mission to adapt to the changes.

Re:Sand?

[Timesprout]

Its not just sand, its a beach ergo there must be water.

Martian walks into a bar

[WillAffleckUW]

A Martian walked into a bar, and ordered a glass of water.

Bartender said, "We're a bar, we just serve alcoholic drinks."

Martian said "Well, since I'm not an alchohol-based life form, could I just have a glass of water instead?"

And that, friends, is why Mars is Dry.

Re:There's no crying in baseball!

[R3d M3rcury]

...So I figure I'll google "Gertrude Weise" and see if I can get some info to see if there's some reason that they picked the name or are they just coming up with names. I run into Spirit Mission Manager Reports: [nasa.gov]. It catches my eye for these two quotes, taken entirely out of context:

• "[...] Spirit backed up over Gertrude Weise [...]"
• "Spirit acquired full color 13-filter images of Gertrude Weise [...]"

It's not clear whether Spirit took the pictures before or after backing over Gertrude Weise--if it was after, it may have been done for insurance purposes...

By the way, in reading the article, I notice that Spirit is near something that NASA is calling "Home Plate." So I assume that's what the baseball references are. There's also a "Virginia Bell" [baseballhistorian.com] (not be confused, I assume, with this Virginia Bell [javasbachelorpad.com]), "Kathryn Beare" [baseball-reference.com], and "Janice O'Hara" [baseball-reference.com].

OK. Let's man a mission to mars

[JumperCable]

All we have to do is tell the TSA that there may have been liquids on mars. NOW it's a homeland security issue.

Re:Sand?

[jzeejunk]

yes... and not only that, they also found evidence that uranus is wet too. sorry couldn't resist

Re:Sand?

[Joebert]

Nude beach?

I hope not, women are from Venus.

Re:Still more evidence...

[gregleimbeck]

After we dusted the surface with the first few manned missions where insertion didn't quite work as planned (like many of the robotic missions have done), then perhaps.

Then most of us decided that dating was a waste of time, and we should just go back to reading Slashdot.

Re:Sand?

[fractoid]

And conversely, Mars will soon be our primary source of melange. ;)

Re:Looks like ...

[Paradise Pete]

If only the produce in my fridge could last that long past its estimated use date.

Have you tried keeping it on Mars?

Re:There's no crying in baseball!

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently she now has a famous wet spot.

Hot jupiters, Wet Mars, Hot Ice - gosh

[unity100]

will the madness never end ?

Something surprising ...

[RingDev]

"Spirit worked within about 50 yards or meters of the Gertrude Weise area for more than 18 months before the discovery was made."

Apparently we're still working out which measurement system we're using.

-Rick