Immense ice deposits found at south pole of Mars

Reuters via Yahoo! ^ | 3-16-07 | Will Dunham

[Interesting Times]

When did this happen? I know of the earth impact that created the moon, but am unfamiliar with such a Mars event.

Not recently. Here is a link.

[macamadamia]

Terraform it. Make it habitable. All us conservatives move there. If the liberals want to "save the Earth" then let 'em have it. We'll take Mars!



You're on to something. It's destiny. First it was red state/blue state. In the future it will be Red Planet/Blue Planet.

[zendari]

Damn, you stole my line!

[SampleMan]

Not hard to do, just need a big mylar sheet.

I thought my Suburban would do it?

[Enchante]

No, how 'bout we keep the lovely planet earth and they get Mars? Most of 'em are from there anyway......

[RockinRight]

OK.

Let's see 'em maintain Mars with all those welfare queens sucking up all their money.

[theFIRMbss]

>why aren't we funding NASA more?

Because for every mission that goes correctly, there are three or four massive scale f*ck #ps. Oh, and they've got some problems with their personnel . . .

[CindyDawg]

Before we move in, maybe we should check out the place and make sure it's vacant and for sale first.

[I see my hands]

In the past I worked 1500 ft beneath Lake Erie for the International Salt Co. They produced Diamond Crystal brand table salt and Halite brand rock salt.

I drove to the job in a Ford Fairlane Galaxy-500.

[agere_contra]

Same reason the Earth's warmest temps are on the equator, LOL

Its not to do with a longer trip through the atmosphere. The light/heat that hits the poles is shared out across a greater surface area of biosphere (land, sea, whatever). Wheras at the equator the light hits at 90 degrees at noon - so there is maximum intensity per sq metre.

[montag813]

GET YOUR ASS TO MARS!

[safeasthebanks]

Exactly.

I'm about as far from a scientist as you can get, but I understand that it is Mars' lack of an electro-magnetic field that is the biggest obstacle to life there. At least as much of an obstacle as temperature, aridness and atmosphere (which I think is also actually related to the lack of the E-M field).

[Vn_survivor_67-68]

you might like to get out a compass, pencil, and ruler.....

atmosphere/air ain't just "whatever"......and arrival is different than "shared out", whatever THAT is.

[Alas Babylon!]

Actually, the water didn't migrate to the poles, but the water that was at the poles (assuming there was water everywhere) froze. The water elsewhere evaporated out into space, leaving only the poles with lots of water--in frozen form.

[Lokibob]

You also have to think of the Martian atmosphere as NOT simiar to the earths atmosphere on the surface.

On Mars surface, it is equivalent to the Earth at 100,000 feet. That is the pressure in the 10 millibar range, and the temperatures goes from -100F to +80 F.

At 10 millibars, the atmosphere can NOT hold very much water vapor. The only way water vapor can stay in the atmosphere is at very cold temperatures, not allowing much evaporation. At the poles you have very little sunlight for evaporation and very cold temperatures year round.

[Vn_survivor_67-68]

At the poles you have very little sunlight for evaporation and very cold temperatures year round.

Aha! :)

[GalaxieFiveHundred]

In the past I worked 1500 ft beneath Lake Erie for the International Salt Co. They produced Diamond Crystal brand table salt and Halite brand rock salt. I drove to the job in a Ford Fairlane Galaxy-500.

I think today would be a good day for you to buy a lottery ticket...

[anymouse]

We need to start the Mars terraforming at once. Send nuclear generators there to start hydrolysis the water melted from the waste heat of the nuke generator into oxygen vented to the atmosphere and hydrogen burned in secondary generators. After a while the oxygen partial pressure will be enough for high altitude organisms to utilize and raise the overall atmospheric pressure enough for plants to thrive on the high carbon dioxide content. A way to bootstrap Mars into a livable planet, al beit a harsh one.

[Lokibob]

2 problems hit me right away with your "simple solution.
#1- How heavy is a mylar sheet the size of Texas? OK, so you say 1/10 the size of Texas? Thats gonna take a lot of delta rockets, and a lot of people sewing the mylar together.
and #2- (this is the big one), How do you get 1/3 of the atmospheric pressure of earth, when Mars is only 1/6th the size of Earth. Remember, atmospheric pressure is determined by the the gravity of the planet.

[Yossarian]

We need to start the Mars terraforming at once. Send nuclear generators there to start hydrolysis the water melted from the waste heat of the nuke generator into oxygen vented to the atmosphere and <...> A way to bootstrap Mars into a livable planet, al beit a harsh one.

BZZZT! Sorry, but thanks for playing. Mars needs at least two preconditions to become a livable planet, in the way we'd like it: a) more gravity, and b) an electromagnetic field.

Without the gravity, the atmosphere won't get dense enough to support our kind of life. Maybe variants of mosses that grow at earth high altitude, but that's about it.

Without the EM field, solar 'wind' (really just the pressure of charged particles coming out of the Sun) will just blow a wispy atmosphere away. Earth's EM field counters the effect of the solar wind.

We probably could create some kind of ecosystem there, but Mars will never be where you really would want to live.