Underground Lake Discovered on Mars

So, this was really big news a couple weeks ago, and I was going to write about it last week. But then I found the German beer bottle fiasco and thought it was too good to pass up writing about. Hey, that Martian lake's lasted this long, it can wait a couple weeks.

Anyway, we've found a lake. Filled with liquid water. On Mars. It's a mile underneath the southern ice cap, so we won't be visiting it any time soon, but still, liquid water. A significant body of liquid water on Mars, roughly analogous to Lake Vostok in Antarctica. The Red Planet seems to be sending us mixed signals here, on the one hand, we've confirmed that Mars simply doesn't have enough carbon dioxide left to be terraformed, but on the other hand, we've got this. A lake, about 12 miles across and at minimum 3 feet deep. That's a decent amount of water, and considering what we know, if there's liquid water, there's a good chance there's life.

This is still science we're talking about here, and the discovery still needs to be confirmed. But if it is a lake, it seems like it could be an excellent warm-up for when we explore Europa and Enceladus. Mars is much closer, after all, and I think it's likely we'll get there sometime this century. The water isn't that far underneath the surface, and if there is life floating around in this lake, surely that would boost the odds of life existing under the ice of those moons. All we need to do first is get to Mars. No problem, right?