Badwater Crater

Badwater Crater is an impact crater located in Hellas Planitia and is situated within the low lying Plain of Peneus Palus on the southern hemisphere of Mars. It contains the lowest currently known point on the entire Planet, with an elevation of approximately -8200 m at 32.79° S, 62.14° E. Badwater has a diameter of approximately 33.14 km.

Badwater is a particularly interesting geological feature on Mars, not only because of its depth but also because it may be one of the only places on the entire planet where seasonal flows of possible liquid water solutions of brine can exist near or potentially on its surface without being immediately vaporised. This has been observed as various dark streaks of what seems to be some type of hydrated salts discovered by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and the HiRISE camera onboard the MRO from NASA

This could be potentially explained by the warmer months of the year in Mars's orbit on its equatorial plane being heated from the melting of the frozen carbon dioxide on its polar ice caps. This allows the atmosphere to temporarily become thicker than its average 610 Pa to a much greater atmospheric pressure of 1250 Pa due to the atmosphere of Mars stacking upon itself from the immense depth of the hellas impact basin. This leads to an atmospheric pressure of approximately 1.5% that of the Earth.

Name
Badwater Crater is named after Badwater, California in Badwater Basin, the lowest point in North America. The name for the crater was officially adopted by the IAU on the 11 April 2015.

The name for the crater was specifically chosen since Badwater basin is incredibly salty with liquid water being more of an undrinkable brine not great for consumption. The same natural occurrence happens on Mars as its only remaining water content in this crater is incredibly high in its salt content therefore the IAU accepted the name as it suits its particular similarities with the crater.