The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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The SAFER field trial in Chile's Atacama Desert used ESA’s ExoMars rover as its ‘reference mission’, which will include a drill to probe beneath the surface of Mars. SAFER’s test rover was not equipped with a real drill, however. In order to acquire ‘ground truth’ the field team had to dig a hole in the white area of the ‘SAFER Valley’ test site nicknamed the ‘pond’ and then a trench in the radar raster scan location. At the simulated drill location in the raster scan, the field team found a layer of rock starting at a depth of 60 cm. This comes close to the kind of features the team was looking for: analogues for locations on Mars that could hold traces of past or present life.