Curiosity has already seen plenty of evidence for past running water in Gale Crater and the results from the drill-hole analysis are expected to reveal further information about that wet history.

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Last week, rescue coordinator Andre Sougarret said initially the Schramm T-130, would be used to drill a 12-inch bore hole down to the miners to enable rescue workers to deliver larger survival items for the miners, but he said if possible the same drill would be used to widen the hole to 28 inches -- sufficient to hoist the miners back to the surface.

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The Plan A drill -- a mining drill -- reached 148 meters (486 feet), but the hole it was drilling would still need to be widened to 70 centimeters (27.5 inches) to accommodate the rescue capsule.

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Officials said both efforts -- to drill a rescue shaft and widen a bore hole -- could be carried out concurrently.

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This pivot is best illustrated by the story of Theodore Leavitt, a professor at Harvard Business School who told his students not to try to sell customers a quarter-inch drill, but a way to make a quarter-inch hole.

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What they've done before the commercial versions is using, like, five-gallon buckets of this drill hole in the bottom, so they can plant through, put some dirt in and hang it up.

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Later tests found oxygen levels at about 7 percent -- too little to survive -- but that may be because the drill hole drifted as it was being bored, Stickler said.

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Either way it is particularly disappointing when you drill a dry hole such as happened to the partners in the Blueberry Hill side-track well (EXXI was not among them), which found nothing and required a write-down in the quarter, surely a factor in the price drop of the stock.

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