Mars reportedly has caves where humans can survive. On September 30th The New York Times, a U.S. media outlet, presented nine small caves with great future exploration value at a meeting of the U.S. Geological Association. “Dr. Bardabelias’ research team reviewed 1,000 caves and their characteristics to find areas where humans can live on Mars,” the newspaper said.

Mars has strong radiation and can cause large and small meteorite damage. In addition, there is a large difference in temperature during the day and night. According to the report, Dr. Bardabelias’ team discovered a cave that could withstand this harsh Martian environment. The team examined 1,000 caves and their characteristics, the entrances of which were captured in high-resolution images taken by the Mars Orbiter, to find the most habitable area on Mars.  

The research team stipulated that all of these caves are located within 100 kilometers of an area with an altitude of less than 300 meters, which is a suitable distance for the spacecraft to land safely.

Dr. Bardabelias said, “The atmosphere on Mars is very difficult for a spacecraft to enter, descend, and land without troubles. It is because the slowing effect indispensable for the spacecraft to land on Mars is too weak and it cannot afford to land smoothly in time after touching the surface of the atmosphere.”

The research team has searched only for places with photos with 1m resolution crosswise taken by high-resolution scientific experiment equipment of the Mars Exploration Orbit satellites. These places accounted for only 5 percent of the total. There were 139 caves that met the search conditions, and the research team reviewed each of these photos and excluded the places where the bridge-shape rock was formed, because they would not actually be a cave.

The research team finally identified nine caves with considerable depth. All were closely located from the places where light probes could land, and some caves were deep underground. Dr. Bardabelias said the largest cave out of the nine is the size of a soccer field, and every cave needs close exploration. The research team added that they would use the Mars Orbiter to explore the caves because the current probe on Mars is only capable of close observation.