It first had to get there to figure out how to survive there. Life did not just magically spring up everywhere or spread across the oceans and rivers and from the ocean floor to the surface all at once.
If life started in 1 location it must have migrated all over the earth, somehow.
Earliest known life forms - Wikipedia
Life, just like humans migrated from its place of origin. So how did ice worms get from 400 C hydrothermal vents at the bottom of the oceans to -1C at the polar icecaps 6000 miles away? Did they sprout up or wiggled their way there?
What is the origin of life on Earth?
The concept that life may have spontaneously generated is called abiogenesis. In the remote past precursors to life like amino acids and proteins arose from a primordial soup and managed to arrange themselves into self-replication precellular life forms. This beginning of life eventually composed and transcribed the DNA that forms the basis of the genetic code of life processes today. It’s a fantastic idea – and one that many inside and outside of the scientific community criticize.
In the other corner is abiogenesis’ main – and equally fantastic – rival as explanation for the origin of life on Earth. This concept, panspermia, says that life didn’t begin here on Earth, but elsewhere in the universe or solar system.
Life was carried here, in a vehicle like an asteroid from another planet, and took hold in much the same way that a seed does in fertile soil. Probably more accurately, life would’ve spread like an epidemic disease in a form very similar to the germs that Pasteur uncovered.
No one can be sure which one adequately explains the origin of life on Earth, but amazingly, both have been shown to be possible. In this article, we’ll look at the case each makes. First, we’ll look at a common problem that both theories share.
https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/evolution/origin-of-life-on-earth.htm
Suppose panspermia is correct? That would immediately answer the question if there is life elsewhere in the universe.
question; Why did Tardigrades evolve the ability to survive in space? What natural selective process caused them to acquire the ability to survive 20 years without water by becoming perfectly dormant? Did they ever need this ability and survived the test?
Tardigrades deep in the crust of a comet might well have come from far away.
But even more probable is the the survival of bacteria in or on the icy environment of asteroids.
The constant bombardments of asteroids all over the world would also explain the evolution of different species in different parts (environments) of the world.