Mars discovery: dry ice lake

In this handout image supplied by the European Space Agency (ESA) on July 16, 2008, The Echus Chasma, one of the largest water source regions on Mars, is pictured from ESA's Mars Express. The data was acquired on September 25, 2005. An impressive cliff, up to 4000 m high, is located in the eastern part of Echus Chasma.

The Associated Press:

Los Angeles - Think Mars today is a hostile place? It was worse 600,000 years ago, according to new research that suggests the planet had a dustier, stormier atmosphere.

"It was an unpleasant place to hang out," said lead researcher Roger Phillips of the Southwest Research Institute. He said Mars' climate was probably a lot like the American Dust Bowl of the 1930s – but a lot worse.

The evidence comes from the discovery of a huge underground reservoir of dry ice, or frozen carbon dioxide, at its south pole – much more than scientists realized. They suspect some of that store of carbon dioxide was once in Mars' atmosphere, making it denser.

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