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Manned Mars Mission Some Way Off
10,9,8,7... Count Down Aborted writes "The BBC brings some perspective to the manned mission to Mars debate recently reinvigorated by the discovery of vast H2O ice reserves on Mars. Basically, they list many of the reasons (e.g. psychological, political, monetary, and technological) why we must proceed very carefully and slowly despite the significance of such a mission if it were successful. They also raised the interesting question, "Who should be the members of such a crew if it were to be launched?"" Update: 05/28 14:28 GMT by H : Another good link is on USA Today.
I particularly like this one:
Yeah, it's a shame we have no ice here on Earth with which to test this system. Anyway, the rocket booster that lifted Armstrong and Aldrin off the moon had to "work the first time", and they still signed up.History is full of shortsighted people telling us what scientists can't possibly do, sometimes only months before they do it.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Most of the cost of sending people to Mars is the cost of getting them back again. The trip should be one way, with new people and supplies sent every few months. Eventually, after 10 - 20 years, there may be enough manufacturing capacity on Mars to send people back to Earth, but that wouldn't be guaranteed. I'm sure out the 5 Billion people on Earth we could find a few thousand settlers. Most of the people who settled the "New World" (Europians coming to North America) came on a one way trip.
Maybe the volunteers remaining families would receive money (a pittance compared to the savings). There might be enough demand to go, you could run a lottery, with the winners going and the money raised for paying part of the trip.
I agree with your sentiments despite your pejorative header. :-)
Look, the technology is mostly in place to attempt the so-called Mars Direct mission that has been espoused for a number of years.
We really need to bring back the spirit that brought Apollo to the Moon; imagine the possibility with the right funding that we could have a manned mission to Mars and it will be done in time to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the American Declaration of Independence (2016).
Besides the obvious boon of what we'll learn once we get manned missions there, what science we learn developing the spacecraft and landing systems for the Mars Direct mission could have huge benefits here on Earth; after all, the technology developed for the Apollo program is a major reason why I can type this message on Slashdot.org. ^_^
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
At the university of Maryland this semester, I took a class that had the task of designing a lunar base. We considered using magnetic fields too, until the professor told us the story of a class he had a few years ago that tried to go to jupiter. They wanted to use a magnetic field too, using a superconducting magnetic loop. The ship -HAS- to be torodial (donut shaped) because the ener4getic protons are repelled by the field but attracted to the poles of the magnet. When the professor asked if they had any backup in case the superconductivity failed, the answer was "We dont need to worry about that, because if the superconductivity fails the energy that will be released will vaporize the entire spaceship." To answe your question about how much power it needs, you need cryogenic cooling equipment that is able to maintain liquid nitrogen temperatures for the entire mission duration. If the system fails, your ship goes poof.
Radiation is really a bugbear though. Martian atmosphere provides some protection, and its assumed that if you were establishing a premanent base, you would cover your habitat in enough dirt so that radiation would be at earthlike levels or better. Then just dont go out on EVA during solar flares and youll be ok. Martian atmosphere is enough to protect against cosmic rays and normal levels of solar proton flux, which is the biggest problem for free space radiation. Just build shelters and youll be fine.