Water Ice On Mars

cathector sends along a story from SpaceWeather.com on the discovery of water ice on Mars. "Scientists have figured out the mysterious white substance unearthed by NASA's Phoenix lander on Mars. It's frozen water. The breakthrough came last week when Phoenix's stereo camera caught the substance in the act of disappearing. Bathed in martian sunlight for four days, the white substance sublimated — i.e., it transformed from solid to gas without passing through the liquid state. This is how water behaves on Mars.... Some readers have asked, how do we know the white substance is not frozen CO2 (dry ice) instead of frozen water? Answer: Phoenix's landing site is too warm for dry ice. The average daily temperature is about -70 F while dry ice requires temperatures lower than about -109 F." The animated GIF showing the ice sublimating is pretty nice too.

POOL PARTY!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Now we just need a little global warming.

$3,000,000 mint juleps at next year's derby

[ecklesweb]

In other news, NASA announced today that a manned mission to Mars is planned to retreive the newly found ice in time for the 2012 Kentucky Derby. NASA plans to upstage Woodford Reserve's famous $1000 Mint Julep at the race with its own $3,000,000 version of the traditional cocktail. While plans are still being firmed up, the beverage will reportedly come in a limited edition collector's glass.

Martian ice is really big news, folks!

[commodoresloat]

It means we finally have a suitable accompaniment for Martian scotch.

Re:Martian ice is really big news, folks!

[Anonymous Coward]

Neat!

Sorry - it's a Scotch joke.

Re:Wow

[thermian]

You're absolutelly right, all we need now is some Martian Whisky and the social lives of any future human expedition is well and truly sorted out.

In Other News...

[CaptainPatent]

News fails to take responsibility according to one internet poster.

More at 8.

Re:Martian ice is really big news, folks!

[ScentCone]

It means we finally have a suitable accompaniment for Martian scotch.

Please call it by its proper name, would you?

Martch.

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact, forget the social lives of any future human expedition!

Re:Stupid terraforming..

[Aphoxema]

We could always just ship the abundance of water we have to Mars. Oh, wait, that's 10 years from now when politicians can't deny global warming any longer and they'll need some other boneheaded assumption to go on like water not being all that heavy to launch into space. The shit practically lifts itself!

Re:Wind?

[mrbluze]

But it would selectively blow an ultrafine powder which happened to be white.

Surely the wind would be better off snorting it?

Re:Hundreds of millions spent and...?

[drinkypoo]

Come on, NASA, you're making yourselves look incompetent.

How much water have you found on Mars?

Uh-huh. I thought so...

Re:average daily temperature

[belg4mit]

Send your own fucking probe if you can't be bothered to subtract 32 and multiply by 4/9.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:average daily temperature

[drawfour]

They would be better off sending their own fucking probe than subtracting 32 and multiplying by 4/9. I'm not sure what units those are, but certainly not Celsius.

I know

[Anonymous Coward]

Pretty much anything can sublimate under the proper conditions. But when you say "a white solid that sublimates at -70 degrees F and martian surface pressure and is found in macroscopic quantities naturally" you narrow down the field quite a bit. In this case, to exactly one reasonable possibility.

Yep, Vodka.

Re:Life on Mars

[arb phd slp]

Perhaps next mission they should take along some sugar. Put it out and see if it 'sublimates' as well.

Memo to all Enforcers:
By order of the Council of Elders, anyone caught consuming the sweet, sweet bait near the robotic invader from the blue planet is to have his gelsacs summarily pierced.
Signed,
K'Breel

Re:Wow

[mobby_6kl]

> Hopefully they are right about it.
Of course they're right about it, they have solid photographic evidence. [nasa.gov]

Re:Life on Mars

[HitekHobo]

A similar experiment was recently conducted to determine the existence of life in Congress. A large pile of money was left sitting out which sublimated while votes accreted; thereby proving the existence of life in Congress. It is still up for debate how long before intelligent life is found in Congress.

Re:I know

[wellingj]

Vodka is just sitting around mars on the ground? Where do we buy the tickets...

Re:Wind?

[jericho4.0]

The AC is thinking critically, while you appeal to authority. Which type gets to work at NASA?

Re:One Problem:

[Anonymous Coward]

>> Science is a hard mistress; she demands proof before making such claims.

I shall have this woman.

Re:Wow

[pclminion]

You'd hope that after 300 or so years of chemistry we'd understand how to recognize water...

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Wow

[mrmeval]

Are they sure it's NOT martian whiskey? ;) Or some sort of liquid that looks like water when frozen?

are you absolutely sure?

[jollyreaper]

You say you think it's sublimation
Well you know
that'd be out of this world
What else could explain the diminution
Well you know
that'd be out of this world
But when you talk about reduction
Don't you know ice ain't the only thing
Don't you know other substances are white [x3]

You say you got an aqueous solution
Well you know
We'd all want to see the proof
Martians might be liliputian
Well you know
Look for them if you can can
But if you want money for space probes that crater
All I can tell you is brother maybe later
Learn how to use metrics first, alright? [x4]

Re:Snow

[Anonymous Coward]

we should wisely remember that all these claims of ice or dry ice and so many other speculations are based on our earthly experience and so are limited to our sense perception. the fact is that every planet, all those millions that you can and cannot see in the sky are fully habitable and many many people are living there. this is the knowledge coming from the topmost intelligent people who have ever appeared on this planet and given fully scientific information about other planets. spending billions on exploring other planets is waste of money when such knowledge already exists. For more details read "easy journey to other planetes" by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. Hare Krishna.

Re:average daily temperature

[Solandri]

Could we have this important information in units used by, I don't know, the rest of the world?

Hah! With this announcement, NASA has predicated that Fahrenheit is now used on the surface of two worlds, thus re-establishing its dominance over that other temperature unit which is only used in part of one world. We will wrest control of this universe back from you metric heathens, even if we have to do it one planet at a time!

Re:Stupid terraforming..

[Fizzl]

You leave Mr. Stallman out of this!

Re:average daily temperature

[o'davy]

Calculate your own conversion to attempt-by-the-French-to-regain-relevance-on-the-world-stage units.

Gee, if metric is an attempt by France to regain relevance, they've succeeded everywhere bar America.

And yet they've succeeded in every bar in America. Checking the units used to measure wine and booze ... yep, metric.

Re:Water sublimating

[mrbluze]

.... and iodine is not what I'd call an excitingly white substance.

Not exciting, but certainly sublime.

Re:Wind?

[neumayr]

You're right. Definitely photoshopped. [xkcd.com]

Re:average daily temperature

[Devil's BSD]

Long live imperial units! I say, if God had wanted us to use metric, He would have given us ten fingers! ...

oh, crap.

The ultimate proof of global warming

[sTERNKERN]

Even Martian ice is melting. We are doomed.

Re:I know

[Thelasko]

In other news, the Russians have designed, built and flown, the first manned mission to Mars in an astonishing 3 days. The leader of the mission says, "We hope to be there by happy hour!"

That's not water...

[linuxpyro]

After looking at that fascinating GIF from the summary, I'm not sure it is water. It just kind of disappears. It's probably some sort of highly advanced life form that can change its shape at will and lives beneath the planet's surface most of the time. It then just came up for a little Martian sunshine and, upon noticing our probe went back to tell its buddies that the Earthlings sent more crap to their planet and that they should expect an invasion soon. Unless they can prove to us they don't have any oil.

Well, that's what it looks like to me. Draw your own conclusions.