[meteorite-list] Fw: NASA Spacecraft Sees Ice on Mars Exposed by Meteor Impacts

[E.P. Grondine]

I am certain that most here will want this info, so just in case Ron Baalke does not post this. Here goes:

--- On Thu, 9/24/09, NASA News <hqnews at mediaservices.nasa.gov> wrote:

> From: NASA News <hqnews at mediaservices.nasa.gov>
> Subject: NASA Spacecraft Sees Ice on Mars Exposed by Meteor Impacts
> To: "NASA News" <hqnews at mediaservices.nasa.gov>
> Date: Thursday, September 24, 2009, 2:22 PM
> Sept. 24, 2009
> 
> Dwayne Brown 
> Headquarters, Washington 
> 202-358-1726 
> dwayne.c.brown at nasa.gov
> 
> 
> Guy Webster 
> Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 
> 818-354-6278 
> guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov
> 
> 
> RELEASE: 09-224
> 
> NASA SPACECRAFT SEES ICE ON MARS EXPOSED BY METEOR IMPACTS
> 
> PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has
> revealed 
> frozen water hiding just below the surface of mid-latitude
> Mars. The 
> spacecraft's observations were obtained from orbit after
> meteorites 
> excavated fresh craters on the Red Planet. 
> 
> Scientists controlling instruments on the orbiter found
> bright ice 
> exposed at five Martian sites with new craters that range
> in depth 
> from approximately 1.5 feet to 8 feet. The craters did not
> exist in 
> earlier images of the same sites. Some of the craters show
> a thin 
> layer of bright ice atop darker underlying material. The
> bright 
> patches darkened in the weeks following initial
> observations, as the 
> freshly exposed ice vaporized into the thin Martian
> atmosphere. One 
> of the new craters had a bright patch of material large
> enough for 
> one of the orbiter's instruments to confirm it is water
> ice. 
> 
> The finds indicate water ice occurs beneath Mars' surface
> halfway 
> between the north pole and the equator, a lower latitude
> than 
> expected in the Martian climate. 
> 
> "This ice is a relic of a more humid climate from perhaps
> just several 
> thousand years ago," said Shane Byrne of the University of
> Arizona. 
> 
> Byrne is a member of the team operating the orbiter's High
> Resolution 
> Imaging Science Experiment, or HiRISE camera, which
> captured the 
> unprecedented images. Byrne and 17 co-authors report the
> findings in 
> the Sept. 25 edition of the journal Science. 
> 
> "We now know we can use new impact sites as probes to look
> for ice in 
> the shallow subsurface," said Megan Kennedy of Malin Space
> Science 
> Systems in San Diego, a co-author of the paper and member
> of the team 
> operating the orbiter's Context Camera. 
> 
> During a typical week, the Context Camera returns more than
> 200 images 
> of Mars that cover a total area greater than California.
> The camera 
> team examines each image, sometimes finding dark spots that
> fresh, 
> small craters make in terrain covered with dust. Checking
> earlier 
> photos of the same areas can confirm a feature is new. The
> team has 
> found more than 100 fresh impact sites, mostly closer to
> the equator 
> than the ones that revealed ice. 
> 
> An image from the camera on Aug. 10, 2008, showed apparent
> cratering 
> that occurred after an image of the same ground was taken
> 67 days 
> earlier. The opportunity to study such a fresh impact site
> prompted a 
> look by the orbiter's higher resolution camera on Sept. 12,
> 2009, 
> confirming a cluster of small craters. 
> 
> "Something unusual jumped out," Byrne said. "We observed
> bright 
> material at the bottoms of the craters with a very distinct
> color. It 
> looked a lot like ice." 
> 
> The bright material at that site did not cover enough area
> for a 
> spectrometer instrument on the orbiter to determine its
> composition. 
> However, a Sept. 18, 2008, image of a different
> mid-latitude site 
> showed a crater that had not existed eight months earlier.
> This 
> crater had a larger area of bright material. 
> 
> "We were excited about it, so we did a quick-turnaround
> observation," 
> said co-author Kim Seelos of Johns Hopkins University
> Applied Physics 
> Laboratory in Laurel, Md., "Everyone thought it was water
> ice, but it 
> was important to get the spectrum for confirmation." 
> 
> The Mars orbiter is designed to facilitate coordination and
> quick 
> response by the science teams, making it possible to detect
> and 
> understand rapidly changing features. The ice exposed by
> fresh 
> impacts suggests that NASA's Viking 2 lander, digging into
> 
> mid-latitude Mars in 1976, might have struck ice if it had
> dug four 
> inches deeper. 
> 
> The Viking 2 mission, which consisted of an orbiter and a
> lander, 
> launched in September 1975 and became one of the first two
> space 
> probes to land successfully on the Martian surface. The
> Viking 1 and 
> 2 landers characterized the structure and composition of
> the 
> atmosphere and surface. They also conducted on-the-spot
> biological 
> tests for life on another planet. 
> 
> NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena manages the
> Mars 
> Reconnaissance Orbiter for NASA's Science Mission
> Directorate in 
> Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver built
> the 
> spacecraft. The Context Camera was built and is operated by
> Malin. 
> The University of Arizona operates the HiRISE camera, which
> Ball 
> Aerospace & Technologies Corp., in Boulder, Colo.,
> built. The Johns 
> Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory led the
> effort to build 
> the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer and
> operates it in 
> coordination with an international team of researchers. 
> 
> To view images of the craters and learn more about the Mars
> 
> Reconnaissance Orbiter, visit: 
> 
> 
> 
> http://www.nasa.gov/mro 
> 
>     
> -end-
> 
> 
> 
> To subscribe to the list, send a message to: 
> hqnews-subscribe at mediaservices.nasa.gov
> To remove your address from the list, send a message to:
> hqnews-unsubscribe at mediaservices.nasa.gov
>