Evros Vallis, south of the Schiaparelli crater on Mars
Evros Vallis, south of the Schiaparelli crater on Mars
In the foreground is the branching course of the Evros Vallis valley, south of the Schiaparelli crater, whose plains can be seen in the background in the top third of the image. Evros Vallis extends for approximately 350 kilometres through the ancient highlands of Noachis Terra. It bears witness to a time, more than three and a half billion years ago, when Mars must still have had a water cycle – with clouds, precipitation, surface run-off, rivers and lakes, from which water evaporated and fell again as rain. Sediments transported by Evros Vallis are likely to have contributed to filling the Schiaparelli basin, which was once more than four kilometres deep.