In February — just three months after Britney Schmidt proposed the possibility of subglacial lakes within Europa's thick ice crust — Russian scientists announced that they had drilled through the ice to reach Vostok. (discovermagazine.com)
High - resolution image of Europa's fractured ice crust, taken by the Galileo probe. (americaspace.com)
Europa, meanwhile, appears to be entirely covered by an ocean, sandwiched between a rocky core and a thin ice crust. (newscientist.com)