NASA's Mars Odyssey Finds Huge Ice/Water Deposits on the Red Planet On May 28 NASA scientists finally got good news from its 2001 Mars Odyssey spacecraft. But it was far more than good news - it was amazing news. The Gamma Ray Spectrometer suite on board discovered large amounts of hydrogen just under the surface of Mars, indicating the presence of ice/water.

"This is really amazing. This is the best direct evidence we have of subsurface water ice on Mars. We were hopeful that we could find evidence of ice, but what we have found is much more ice than we expected," said Dr. William Boynton, principal investigator for Odyessey's gamma ray spectrometer suite at the University of Arizona, Tucson.

"The underground ice is a remarkable discovery and the big question is: is this the tip of the iceberg," Dr. James Gavin, NASA's senior Mars scientist, asked.  The location of these vast reservoirs of  sub-surface ice stretch from both poles to within 50 degrees of the equator.  The discovery confirms data received earlier from NASA this year and may answer the age-old question of where ancient Mars water disappeared.

Where there is water, many believe, there is life, and this discovery re-opens the door to the question of whether there was once life on Mars, or even, if it still exists? It spurs interest in sending a manned mission to Mars and makes that eventuality even more practical. If there are large quantities of water on Mars astronauts will be able to make their own fuel from it for the return flight home - perhaps. There are a great many questions to be answered until that is finally determined. But there are a number of robotic Mars probes scheduled in the next few years that may supply the answers needed to that question. The European Space Agency will launch "Mars Express, both and orbiter and lander, aboard a Russian Soyus-Fregat booster in May of 2003. It features a sub-surface sounding radar developed by the U.S. and Italy. The British "Beagle 2" Lander is set for launch in December, 2003. This compact lander carries a sophisticated  instrument package and a robotic arm to study Martian exobiology and geochemistry of the surface. Since the newest discovery of water/ice in May, NASA is now thinking of sending small Scout probes to specific areas to provide more answers.

Manned space missions or Robotic space missions? There is a huge difference in cost, but perhaps an even greater danger and cost applicable to a future manned mission exists, which no one has considered - except my friend Nancy S. Mahoney, Editor of the Space N Stuff website: www.spacenstuff.com . In an article on this subject she writes, "Remember what happened to the Native Americans oh those many centuries ago? When "we" began to arrive from Europe, in addition to customs and luggage, we brought germs and nasty 'bugs', as well. We imposed our diseases on those who treasured this continent and managed to destroy many a Native American, albeit, not intentionally. Would history repeat itself on Mars?" I hasten to add that what we bring back from Mars could work the same way to "We". Before anyone goes to Mars all this has to be carefully considered.

We'll examine this entire question in future articles.

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