ELON MUSK, TAKE NOTE: Scientists Discover Giant Reservoir Of ‘Hidden Water’ Just Three Feet Below Mars’ Grand Canyon.

The European Space Agency and the Russian space agency Roscosmos jointly manage TGO. The orbiter is equipped with a device that maps hydrogen in the top layer of Martian soil. Data reveal an unusually high concentration of hydrogen in Candor Chaos, a key section of Valles Marineris, implying that up to 40% of the near-surface material in that location could contain water.

“With TGO we can look down to one meter below this dusty layer and see what’s going on below Mars’ surface — and, crucially, locate water-rich ‘oases’ that couldn’t be detected with previous instruments,” Igor Mitrofanov of the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences said in an ESA statement on Wednesday. Mitrofanov is the lead author of a paper published in the journal Icarus on water discoveries.

Valles Marineris is so huge that NASA refers to it as “the Grand Canyon of Mars.” Except that it’s a lot bigger than the US landmark. The Mars version is 1,860 miles (3,000 kilometers) long and reaches a depth of 5 miles (8 kilometers).

The water in Valles Marineris may be mineralized, but the scientists believe it is more likely to be in the form of ice.

That would make it much easier to get to.