NASA eyes a possible landing on Jupiter's Europa

Close-up image from NASA's Galileo spacecraft of a portion of Europa's icy surface, cracked in patterns suggesting floating sea ice. NASA is setting its sights on getting a much closer, deeper look at Jupiter's tantalizing moon, Europa, and the mysterious ocean hidden beneath its icy crust. With two orbital missions already in the works, by NASA and the European Space Agency, NASA is looking further into the future toward a possible mission to put a robot on the surface. Europa's ocean, which may lie under only a few miles of ice--perhaps only a few hundred feet in some places--may be as deep as 30 miles, and contains more water than in all of Earth's oceans. With the possibility of some form of hydrothermal vents supplying heat and life-supporting chemicals on the ocean's floor, like those on Earth, the tiny moon has become one of the hottest subjects in the search for extraterrestrial life in the solar system.