WATER ON MARS
Orbiters and rovers have found evidence of a watery past on the Red Planet. But why is this evidence so important?
WORDS JAMES HORTON
DID YOU KNOW?
The Perseverance rover touched down on the Martian surface on 18 February 2021
Mars may once have been covered in oceans, and some water may persist on the planet
The fourth planet from our Sun, Mars, is named after the Roman god of war, so dubbed because of its bloody-red colour. In 1897, novelist H. G. Wells wrote in his book The War of the Worlds that this colour was owed to organic red weeds that covered the planet’s surface. However, when Mariner 9, the first spacecraft to orbit another planet, cruised around the red world, it revealed an endless landscape of dry, barren desert. In stark contrast to an abundant bounty of weed life, the reality of the Red Planet is a desolate biome covered in iron-rich dust and rocks.
But on and underneath the rocky surfaces, chasms and crevices of this world, there’s a compelling mystery. The more we look, the more we find evidence that water may once have been abundant on Mars, and some think that liquid water is still hidden there.
Water is believed to be integral to the origin of life. Such is the importance of water that when exploring the Martian landscape, NASA adopted a similar strategy to Earth colonists exploring new lands, opting to ‘follow the water’. Looking at the dry and barren surface, this strategy may appear misguided. But today’s appearance doesn’t mean the world was always this way.