At Pahrump we are considering potential drill sites. The heavy signs of veining and water will make for an interesting mineralogical and fluid composition study.
Meanwhile as a benchmark in the mission’s progress there has been a public announcement about the Mt Sharp results, which includes the sediments we have been studying as we have drive around in Pahrump. From the early sols of the misioin e.g. Hottah, Link localities we knew we had fluvial river depsits but the flat lying sediments and cross bedding suggest that Gale has also preserved lake deposts.
Looking at the classic Mars Global Surveyor wide angle view of Mars and its atmosphere you can see the heaviliy cratered surface of Mars. Many craters have sediment mountains and signs of rivers. So there were probably widespread lakes at this time on Mars’ ~3.7 billion years ago. An ocean on Mars used to seem implausible, but our ideas about Mars are now evolving so rapidly that such theories will be revisited.
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