When I was a young teenager delighting in the works of Robert Heinlein the interplanetary exploits of his characters didn’t fare well with astronomy at the time. I remember to my great disappointment hearing that there was no water anywhere in the solar system except on Earth and that there might not be any in the galaxy except on Earth. Frankly, with what we know today I think I simply read the wrong articles or news.
Of course, almost a century later astronomers have a totally different take on water in the Solar System, in fact some scientific evidence suggests that Earth doesn’t even have the most water in our system. The under surface water of #Enceladus (moon of Saturn) may have an ocean that contains more water than all the oceans of Earth combined. I have a manuscript with a working title “Salt of the Earth” completed and have plans for a follow-up that uses the ocean of Enceladus as a secondary setting for “Sea of Salt”. Note: Salt is the central character’s name.
Enceladus is not the only source of water outside of Earth. Europa, Ganymede, Triton, Titan, Callisto, Dione, and even former planet Pluto have strong evidence of liquid water. Mars once had an ocean, but even in my youth people believed that Mars once had water. Now it appears that there is still some water on Mars, its just a matter of uncovering it. The latest (at least for me) water find is on our own Moon. Whether or not there is subterranean free flowing or ice water is yet to be confirmed, but the Chinese recently confirmed finding water molecules in the mid latitudes. We now believe there is ice/water at the South Pole of the Moon.
Another interesting twist on the whole water issue comes from current theories about where Earth’s water actually came from. The most strongly held belief at this time is that Earth’s water came from water-rich asteroid collisions. Certainly not all the asteroids with frozen ice have already hit Earth. There are plenty more asteroids out there where these came from. That actually was a critical plot point in “Salt of the Earth”. No pre-sales on that manuscript though. I’m currently focusing on having just released the 10-year anniversary of the Orion’s Spur series book 1, Demeter. We have just released the entire 5-book series on #Audiblebooks.