2/3 time more water on Europa than on Earth

Remember this picture when all the water on Earth was gathered into a 860 miles wide ball?

Hard to believe? .... there's more incredible!

Now take a look at the comparison picture below where we can clearly see that there's 2/3 time more water on Europa than on Earth:

How much of Jupiter's moon Europa is made of water? A lot, actually.

Based on the Galileo probe data acquired during its exploration of the Jovian system from 1995 to 2003, Europa posses a deep, global ocean of liquid water beneath a layer of surface ice. The subsurface ocean plus ice layer could range from 80 to 170 kilometers in average depth.
Adopting an estimate of 100 kilometers depth, if all the water on Europa were gathered into a ball it would have a radius of 877 kilometers. To scale, this intriguing illustration compares that hypothetical ball of all the water on Europa to the size of Europa itself (left) - and similarly to all the water on planet Earth.
With a volume 2-3 times the volume of water in Earth's oceans, the global ocean on Europa holds out a tantalizing destination in the search for extraterrestrial life in our solar system.

Source

Just imagine the possibilities of the U.S. slashed it's war budget and instead of wasting $700 billion on killing other people we invested in space exploration and mining the moon for minerals and elements? The possibilities would be endless and the results would be amazing.

reply to post by elevenaugust


I am watching ted talk videos, and they were just talking about this. I find it so interesting. I would think that near the core of the moon would give off warmth, and the surface would give off freezing temperatures, creating a habitable zone near the middle for life to thrive!

I thought we knew this? Or am I thinking of a different moon. Either way, there was a guy who was developing technology to drill into the frozen surface and probe the liquid interior. Seeing as the coldest frozen regions on earth contain flourishing life under the surface, it's not impossible to imagine that the same could be said of there.

That is something I would really love to see happen. Even if it were simple life, it would be astonishing to see how it may have evolved, and if it did appear to follow the same evolutionary pattern as life on earth in it's ice ages, it would prove to me that life would exist outside of our solar system... given that I already believe that to be true, it would be a solid fact in my opinion.

Ha sadly, looking for an article of said intent, only leads me to new articles of Europa. I saw it on one of those The Universe episodes, so the salt grain would be particularly large, but easily taken.

bloomin' computer...

double post...

Seeing all that water made me very thirsty.

Originally posted by boncho
Seeing all that water made me very thirsty.

Make sure it's water only, or you know how tomorrow will feel

haha, physician, take thine own advice... *hic*

reply to post by muse7

The possibilities would be endless and the results would be amazing.

There will always be wars. It's human nature.
There is nothing up there that we don't have down here and it's cheaper down here.