Phoenix finds water ice!

[andygates]

Coolest space news evar.  The shiny chunks of white stuff that Phoenix exposed a few days ago have sublimated away.  That makes them ice, not salt or white rocks.  How exciting is this?  The Phoenix official Twitter said "W00t! Best day ever!"  That's how exciting.

Comments

[teahisme.livejournal.com]

super cool... literally.

[despaer.livejournal.com]

Am I just being thick or is there a good reason why a white material that sublimes can't be frozen carbon dioxide? I would like it to be water, it probably is water (as I can't believe Phoenix would post something like that unless they were pretty sure) but I'd still like them to scrape up a chunk and analyze it just to be sure

[andygates.livejournal.com]

I think there's other reasons - it's Martian summer and the CO2 snow doesn't fall until winter, it may sublime at a different rate and so on. But I agree, they need to get some of that into the analyzer and confirm.

[andygates.livejournal.com]

Ah, Wired has a nice little FAQ on this very thing: http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/06/answering-mars.html

[despaer.livejournal.com]

That'll do nicely, thanks. Still reckon it is worth them analyzing it though. After all, our permafrost doesn't all magically melt away during the arctic summer but I agree that it is extremely likely that it is water ice.