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The Real Mission to Mars
The Mars Society is looking for "anyone in good physical condition between 18 and 60 years of age... Scientific, engineering, practical mechanical, wilderness, and literary skills are all considered a plus." Only the passionate need apply: "conditions are likely to be tough and the job will be very trying." And that's before the robot switches into hunter-killer mode.
If you prefer roasting to freezing, there's a mission somewhere in the Australian Outback next year as well. Either way, go visit the Mars Society homepage and check it out.
I spoke with a friend of mine, Daniel Slosberg, who coordinated Mission Support for the Michigan Mars Society during two similar, less-audacious experiments this year. His was the easy job of sitting at home, coordinating communications (chiefly email, with simulated 20-minute round-trip delay), answering questions from the field, and giving advice.
Daniel happens to be working on an idea for distributed mission support; if you're interested in being part of the ground crew, drop him a line.
For the team that actually goes into the wilderness and lives in the "hab," you'll be simulating Mars isolation as accurately as possible. You'll be brutally far north, for one thing. You'll wear a mock-spacesuit every time you go outside, which will help identify where the problems are in e.g. mobility or hygiene. You'll also spend an hour in the airlock when you enter or leave, which will help remind you not to forget your hammer.
The excursions get more sophisticated each year: next year will be the first with an already-completed hab and the first with more than one mock-suit. Your chance to be part of history.
In related news, Odyssey continues aerobraking, and its mission looks good -- if you've read Robinson's Red Mars series, you know how delicate orbital insertion is. Great work, JPL.
And just for kicks, here's a New Scientist article about synthesizing fuel from the Martian atmosphere to power a "hopper"-lander. If you find the practical chemistry of planetary travel interesting, go read Robert Zubrin who is just all about using whatever resources already exist outside Earth's gravity well.
So how much do I get if I'm the last one left?
In space, but more importantly, here on the earth too.
The Mars Society are alternatively hailed as heroes or decried as demagogues. Mars Society president Robert Zubrin is especially vulnerable, being labeled no less than a "messianic" "cult" leader by Robert Park in his acclaimed book Voodoo Science: the Road from Foolishness to Fraud, remarks for which Zubrin supposedly pursued legal action against Park.
The attacks are somewhat ad-hominem, but Park raises an important concern. Whatever the merits of the science the Society is pursuing, it does us no good if the work is blemished by association with individuals of dubious social qualities. If the Society is dominated by demagogues, then their work will be dismissed as just another fancy of another crackpot institution, and civilian space research will be set back for untold years.
The Mars Society has a lot riding on the line. Let's hope they don't fumble the ball this time.
Why bother with building expensive habs? I know tons of OSS programmers who haven't seen the light of day in aeons!
Or perhaps this is targeted advertising...
Is your company running tools written by ma
The article:
... two crucial pieces of construction equipment badly damaged when cargo dropped from a U.S. military transport plane smashed into the ground "without assistance" from a parachute.
:)
Well, at least the NASA methods for delivering payloads to Mars (smashing them into the rock) are being realistically simulated