NASA's First Mars Rover Actually Explored An Ancient Sea

D-brief
By Alison Klesman
Mar 19, 2019 6:00 PMNov 3, 2019 6:54 PM
Mars NASA sojourner rover
The Pathfinder mission landed in Mars' Ares Vallis, where the Sojourner rover catalogued rocks that may have been eroded by floodwaters. (Credit: NASA/JPL)

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Mars may be a dry, cold planet today, but it was once a warmer, wetter one. NASA’s Opportunity rover was the first rover to find solid evidence of water on Mars — but years before Opportunity’s discoveries, NASA’s first Martian rover mission spent its time exploring an ancient spillway that once connected Mars’ northern ocean to an inland sea.

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