Via BBC News:
"In this place, for a few hours each day, just after noon in the summer, there could be liquid water on the surface of Mars."
More on the research can be found at the PDF titled Spring Defrosting In The Russell Crater Dune Field - Recent Surface Runoff Within The Last Martian Year? (or try the google html version.)
The juicy bit from the PDF is this:
"The morphology of the rills indicates that overland flow probably causes the erosion.... We favor an erosion process by liquid water: the rills are located in absolute elevations of ~200 m, and the retreat of the south polar cap leads to an increase of the atmospheric pressure in the southern spring which could allow liquid water to be stable in this region. "
If you want to see the good images check out MOC narrow-angle image M19-01170 and this close-up.
Posted by asa at May 25, 2003 09:58 PMAsa, Given your interest in Mars I thought that you would enjoy this http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/27/science/space/27MARS.html
Posted by: Howie on May 27, 2003 07:44 AMHowie, yeah, thanks. I posted and commented several times about those three missions. MER1 launches on my birthday :-). It'll be interesting to see if the ESA can pull this one off. They're new to this kind of mission. I've got my fingers crossed.
--Asa
Posted by: Asa on May 27, 2003 02:26 PM