Mars, One Explorer, One Way?

[Bateluer]

http://www.searchmagazine.org/Archives/Back Issues/2009 January-February/full-mars.html

For years NASA has basked in well-deserved praise for enabling twelve men to walk on the Moon. But half the people alive today weren’t born in time to watch that spectacle unfold, and these are the younger and most vibrant folks in our society. They know nothing of the tremendous excitement that came when the world collectively held its breath and watched those brave astronauts step out into that hostile place. Since then, many future directions for NASA have been proposed, but none as audacious as the one I discuss here: sending a single astronaut on a one-way trip to Mars, to establish a permanent colony.

Life support and resupply would also be greatly simplified if there is only one astronaut, but perhaps the first human mission might consist of two people; maybe even a male/female team. That privileged couple would follow in the tradition of the creation stories of many earthly religions. The pair would become more than just historic, they would become legend.

Its an interesting article and McLane makes a number of really good points, and I definitely don't think we'd see a shortage of volunteers. There'd probably be more candidates than could be effectively screened.

 

[Chapbass]

Very interesting article...I would think that 2 people would be better than 1. If something happens to one of them (say, heart attack) and dies, we would still be able to be operational at the station until we sound out more people.

I'm intrigued, I think it would be a great endeavor.

 

[shiner]

I'll go and take Meagan Fox with me. At that point I'll be too far away for my wife and her attorney to get to me.

SCORE!!!

 

[Bateluer]

Very interesting article...I would think that 2 people would be better than 1. If something happens to one of them (say, heart attack) and dies, we would still be able to be operational at the station until we sound out more people.

I'm intrigued, I think it would be a great endeavor.

I would agree, with one person, there are too many risks. Two people allow for a much higher 'fault tolerance'. As McLane writes, though, this removes a major obstacle from manned Mars missions, the return trip.

 

[SonicIce]

The real challenge is going there and coming back. As JFK said, "of landing a man on [insert thing] and returning him safely to the Earth." You have to be able to come back, that's what we have to strive for. If you only go one way on a suicide mission then you haven't really completed the goal in my opinion.

 

[TechBoyJK]

So.. you get sent with a hot chick. Bang her for 10 years out there. Have a kid or two. Then knife her down one day and tell them to send another young broad?

 

[zinfamous]

The real challenge is going there and coming back. As JFK said, "of landing a man on [insert thing] and returning him safely to the Earth." You have to be able to come back, that's what we have to strive for. If you only go one way on a suicide mission then you haven't really completed the goal in my opinion.

it's a step towards a goal, and it makes perfect sense, economically, and for research. If we can start the process now, and realize that settling Mars makes no sense...then what would be the point of waiting until the return technology is feasible if we already know that colonizing Mars is impossible, or unreasonable?

I don't know if this is the same guy, but I heard a former NASA scientist advocating the one-way trip several months ago in an NPR interview. His argument was very reasonable.

 

[Alienwho]

Go and watch "Mission to Mars" (I think that's the name of the movie) and then tell me you want to go on a one way trip to Mars.

 

[DesiPower]

No, two is not enough, time period is too long to risk billions on two ppl, we need atleast 4, preferably all bi.

 

[zinfamous]

Go and watch "Mission to Mars" (I think that's the name of the movie) and then tell me you want to go on a one way trip to Mars.

yes...because cheesy, bad science sci fi should influence our decisions.....

 

[Bateluer]

So.. you get sent with a hot chick. Bang her for 10 years out there. Have a kid or two. Then knife her down one day and tell them to send another young broad?

I'm pretty sure that at least one of the pair would be sterile. You wouldn't want pregnancies up there. Its not like you can put ambulance over a doctor and not really feasible to give the astronauts 10 years of medical training, 10 years of engineering, 10 years of computer programming, etc. Another body would produce an unexpected and unplanned strain on logistics and rations, not something you want.

 

[shocksyde]

"Get your ass to Mahs!"

 

[geno]

Imagine being the only person in the history of man kind to ever set foot on another planet or to at least lay eyes upon it up close. To know you may very well be the first AND last. I think it would be an amazing experience, one way or not.

 

[techs]

Sending an automated vehicle to land and return with a sample of Mars is the best, easiest and most likely event.

 

[Bateluer]

Sending an automated vehicle to land and return with a sample of Mars is the best, easiest and most likely event.

Won't stir or motivate the public like a manned mission would. Part of the idea here is to stir up the same pride and emotions that the US saw with the Apollo Moon missions. A robot doesn't do that. Mars has already seen plenty of robots, rovers, landers, and orbiters. Time for people to actually do it now.

 

[her209]

All this can be avoided if we invent teleportation technology.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

No, two is not enough, time period is too long to risk billions on two ppl, we need atleast 4, preferably all bi.

What would that matter? Guys cannot knock other guys up, just as girls cannot knock other girls up.

 

[dank69]

I'll go and take Meagan Fox with me. At that point I'll be too far away for my wife and her attorney to get to me.

SCORE!!!

Make sure she brings her makeup with her.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

I would sign up and apply for this.

You definitely do not want pregnancies on Mars as the first colonists, because pregnancy is very risky. It would be akin to being pregnant in a 3rd world country, where you are likely to die just from the pregnancy.

Also, sending people out to setup "base camp" makes sense. It would be a lot cheaper, happen sooner, and can do it in a short period of time to just send 2-3 people up and then send regular resupply missions. As the author points out, we could send a one-way mission in under 10 years from when we started. Requiring the ability to make a return trip adds many years to the proposed time frame, adds many more costs, and does not gain us anything.

I believe there would be many people who would volunteer for this knowing full well it would be a "suicide mission" (although that would not be how they viewed it most likely, and would instead view it as they were pioneering the next great chapter of humanity).

 

[Jeff7]

Also, sending people out to setup "base camp" makes sense. It would be a lot cheaper, happen sooner, and can do it in a short period of time to just send 2-3 people up and then send regular resupply missions. As the author points out, we could send a one-way mission in under 10 years from when we started. Requiring the ability to make a return trip adds many years to the proposed time frame, adds many more costs, and does not gain us anything.

I believe there would be many people who would volunteer for this knowing full well it would be a "suicide mission" (although that would not be how they viewed it most likely, and would instead view it as they were pioneering the next great chapter of humanity).

Sending robots to set up base camp makes more sense - no need for elaborate life support systems to keep your workforce alive while they do the job. But there's still quite a lot of problems:
- Just lugging all the equipment there would take a LOT of launches. Building one space station that's in a sufficiently low orbit that atmospheric drag makes periodic orbit boosts necessary. But instead, we'd have to send all that stuff completely out of Earth's gravity well, to Mars. Then we have to slow it all down and land it intact. The Mars Exploration Rovers aren't terribly huge things. Google says.......384lbs for the weight of the rover, though it might even be closer to 400. That was landable with the airbag system. Mars Science Lab is a good bit bigger...at about a full ton. That's going to use an elaborate Skycrane landing system - basically a jetpack to slow it down once the parachute has finished doing most of the work. And since Mars has a very thin atmosphere, parachutes are nowhere near as effective as they are here.
I don't know what kind of structure anyone plans on building on Mars, but it's going to have to be pretty damned light, or else we're going to have to book all of Earth's launch sites for the next few years for nothing but Mars launches.

- Shielding from UV, general radiation from the Sun, from micrometeorites, and from dust, which also carries the problem of electrostatic buildup. Head outside for a nice walk, come back, touch the base....zzzzzzzzzt! Damn big static spark.
Also, you'll want batteries. Lots of batteries. (Unless we just pack a nice self-contained nuclear reactor.) When the big dust storms hit, it gets pretty dark, so solar panels won't do much of anything, except gather dust, and enjoy its fine abrasive qualities.
That's where things like robots would be nice. They can go into a quick hibernation mode, just enough to keep their electronics heaters active. Humans...not so much. "Sorry, life support is going to be offline for, oh, I don't know, a month or two. Cheers!"

 

[Ruptga]

The shortcoming of robots is they are pretty limited in their abilities, even one human can do many more things than a robot.

 

[GlacierFreeze]

Imagine being the only person in the history of man kind to ever set foot on another planet or to at least lay eyes upon it up close. To know you may very well be the first AND last. I think it would be an amazing experience, one way or not.

Yeah, and imagine all of the fame and money you won't be getting from it since you're stuck there.

 

[vailr]

One idea being promoted by Richard C. Hoagland on the Coast-to-Coast radio show is to send astronauts to the Mars moon Phobos. Less fuel required to both land and take off from.

 

[Printer Bandit]

i'm amazed at all of the people that think we've never been to other planets before.

 

[destrekor]

Yeah, and imagine all of the fame and money you won't be getting from it since you're stuck there.

The most famous people throughout history, the type of fame that matters, are people who in their lives were extremely poor, genius, crazy, or some level of combination of those.

More people should concern themselves with how the name will be remembered in the future, not how it is known now. It'd be a better world, that's for sure. Immortality through lasting fame/importance would be something I'd love to have. Would never know about it, so you just keep pushing on, trying to do something right.