Shallow Lakes on Mars

This article describes how Nasa's Opprotunity rover are looking at areas of Mars that might have once been shallow lakes. The area on Mars where the excavation is occuring lies close to Mars' equator. Although dried up now there seems to be traces of mineral deposits from the lakebeds that have been erroded due to wind and water. When arriving this possible sight of crater in September of 2006, the Opprotunity began circling the crater for months to find a possible spot to begin its decent into the crater. It was postponed due to sandstorms that hindered both Nasa's Opprotunity and Spirit rovers from decending into the crater. Just recently in August the sandstorms were less intense and the rover was able to make its decent. They just recently have decended 4 meters to see if the rover could make it out. It has been demanded for accent if there is over a 40 percent slip rate. They got to 3 meters where the slip rate became about 40 percent so they returned to the top. The crater is a total of 30 meters deep.