ITHACA,N.Y. -- Scientists report that the more than 9500 images taken during the Mars Pathfinder mission provide strong geological evidence that water was once present on the Red Planet.
A group of researchers including James Bell, a senior research associate at Cornell University and P.H. Smith of the University of Arizona in Tucson, authored "Results from the Mars Pathfinder Camera," published in Science.
The pictures appear to confirm that giant floods scattered stones throughout Ares Vallis, where the spacecraft landed. The researchers also found a very magnetic form of iron oxide, maghemite, in some of the rocks. Maghemite forms in water-rich environments on Earth.