Mars Direct; are we now beating a dead horse?

elderflower · 2017-10-13 15:08:17

I agree completely that we need a pathfinder mission and we need to visit multiple sites. This mission needs to characterise the resources available at each of several sites so two landing parties might be needed to cover the list of maybe ten sites in the first year. Resources include availability of extractable water and suitability of the local ground for construction of long term facilities, for landing huge rockets and refuelling them, probably availability of construction materials so we don't have to take everything with us.

louis · 2017-10-13 16:04:51

I'd make a few points.

A Space X Mission One depends only on locating water and water has been found across huge swathes of the Northern Hemisphere.

Also, we have landings by Rovers that have traversed ground and established how firm it is.

We have a wealth of data from satellite surveys of the Mars surface.

Space X will be landing cargo ships at the landing area first - so no humans will harmed in the making of this mission...if by some mischance the cargo ships disappear into a sink hole then the human mission will be cancelled.

Oldfart1939 · 2017-10-13 19:04:48

This still argues strongly for several Red Mars missions as starters.

louis · 2017-10-13 19:46:51

Well I don't agree on that. I think all the data is there for a BFR mission.

Oldfart1939 wrote:

This still argues strongly for several Red Mars missions as starters.

Oldfart1939 · 2017-10-13 20:49:34

Louis-

To quote my self in running a chemical manufacturing business for 26 years: make your mistakes on a small scale; make your profits on a large scale. Same underlying philosophy should apply to the aerospace industry.

RobertDyck · 2017-10-13 21:14:40

I would land a rover the size of Spirit or Opportunity with a multi-segment core drill. Confirm ice before anyone goes. Then a science mission, leaving a habitat behind for the next mission. Then a small construction team to build mining, refining, and manufacturing to produce propellant and a depot to hold propellant to refuel the SpaceX BFR. And build living quarters (habitat) and life support for the first 100.

You could choose several potential locations, send a rover to each one. Down-select then send science teams to that subset. Then send the construction team to one. Of course I would really like to leverage all the robotic probes (orbiters, landers, rovers) that have been sent during the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s to choose a base location first. Send the rover with multi-segment core drill to a very small number of potential base locations, then select just one and send the science team there. If we don't, if we start over, then the last 27 years have been waste.

louis · 2017-10-14 04:22:38

Well Apollo took a risk - a manageable one I think. There has to be some risk...you could send Rovers, find what looks like the perfect site and then be subjected to some event or other that throws you off. I think landing cargo ships at the site first makes the risk to humans manageable.

Oldfart1939 wrote:

Louis-
To quote my self in running a chemical manufacturing business for 26 years: make your mistakes on a small scale; make your profits on a large scale. Same underlying philosophy should apply to the aerospace industry.

elderflower · 2017-10-14 04:39:02

Oldfart, the aerospace industry makes its mistakes on a large scale and often spectacularly but still makes its profits on a large scale. That's because it has the government (not just yours) by the balls.

GW Johnson · 2017-10-14 10:52:16

I remember the news conference at which Gus Grissom responded to a reporter's question about risk. This was just before the Apollo 1 fire. Gus indicated the estimate was a 1 in 3 chance of getting back alive from the moon.

As it turns out, the odds really weren't quite that bad. Although for Gus and his crew, they were.

GW

elderflower · 2017-10-14 15:30:12

Perceptions that people have of risk are severely skewed. Risks of severe injury in a motor car crash are moderately high, but we accept them every day. If there were a manufacturing industry that had 5000 fatalities every year there would be massive pressure to sort it out. The difference is that the first is freely accepted and the second is imposed on individuals.

Oldfart1939 · 2017-10-14 18:50:40

NASA unfortunately, seems to believe that ANY degree of risk is unacceptable. After frying Grissom, et. al. and losing 2 shuttles with crew, they've become too risk adverse.

Last edited by Oldfart1939 (2017-10-14 19:45:12)

SpaceNut · 2017-10-14 19:52:28

I sort of am warming up to a first manned mission being a sorte landing site science exploration that is designed around what we can truely land at this time as proposed by others in the topic. I do feel that we could work out some details in a seperate topic but thats just me.

So for a 30 day mars landing that allows for a crew of 2 to land, refuel from a fuel cargo lander, a solar lander for power, and a consumables lander in a site means lots of landers for mars and science for all with the suggested alternating of crews that land on the surface.....

Mars_B4_Moon · 2021-05-28 05:51:43

Elon Musk Is Maybe, Actually, Strangely, Going to Do This Mars Thing
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/arc … ch/618781/

The Profound Potential Of Elon Musk’s New Rocket
https://awaken.com/2021/05/the-profound … ew-rocket/

SpaceNut · 2021-05-28 12:54:31

The real profound thing for space x versus others is that the first stage have been designed for reusability to which all others have not.

Thats a trick that others could do but they would only raise the cost of using one of there after doing so rather than getting costs down....

Quaoar · 2021-06-01 09:16:29

Oldfart1939 wrote:

NASA unfortunately, seems to believe that ANY degree of risk is unacceptable. After frying Grissom, et. al. and losing 2 shuttles with crew, they've become too risk adverse.

"If you are looking for perfect safety, you will do well to sit on a fence and watch the birds"
Wilbur Wright

Last edited by Quaoar (2021-06-01 09:17:26)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-10-03 21:52:48

Conversation with Scott Hubbard, the first Mars Program director at NASA, about where the Mars Program is going in the shadow of Mars Sample Return
https://wemartians.com/podcasts/124-the … tt-hubbard

Tianwen-3: China’s Mars sample return mission
https://www.planetary.org/articles/tian … rn-mission

NASA's delayed Artemis rocket launch to Moon shows perils of liquid hydrogen fuel
https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/202 … /101443226

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-10-10 08:21:17

Nasa crews readying Moon rocket for November launch attempt
https://www.yahoo.com/now/nasa-crews-re … 08064.html

China and new missions in deep space between the Moon and Mars, gas giants and asteroids
https://www.wireservice.ca/china-and-ne … asteroids/

A Brief History of Space Tourism
https://rivercountry.newschannelnebrask … ce-tourism

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-03-10 12:04:37

‘It won’t be boring’: SpaceX Starship launch may end in explosion, Elon Musk hints
https://www.aol.com/news/won-t-boring-s … 08591.html

NASA's Artemis 1 Megarocket Launch Was Really, Really Loud
https://gizmodo.com/nasa-artemis-1-sls- … 1850112883
In a new study, scientists crunched the numbers and figured out just how loud the launch of NASA’s SLS megarocket was.

How 'Mars Undergound' sparked a return to the Red Planet
https://astronomy.com/news/2020/06/the- … red-planet
For 20 years, NASA didn’t send a spacecraft to Mars. And to one group of young researchers, that just wasn’t going to fly.

There are many, many Mars Analogue by Mars Society a nonprofit organization done at a far cheaper price than testing a Mars colony on the Moon of Earth.

Near the North Polar region, the arctic portion of the Mars 160 mission concluded on September 3, 2017. Principal Investigators Dr. Shannon Rupert and Dr. Paul Sokoloff acquired permission for research on Inuit-owned land for the first time in FMARS history, allowing for more wide-reaching geology studies than have been done in the past. Dr. Alexandre Mangeot was commander of the Mars 160 mission and was joined by Yusuke Murakami (XO – Executive Officer), Dr. Jonathan Clarke (Crew Geologist), Anastasiya Stepanova (Crew Journalist), Anushree Srivastava (Crew Biologist), and Paul Knightly (Crew Geologist). They arrived at the station on July 15, 2017, and departed Devon Island in mid-August.
https://web.archive.org/web/20170905002 … s-arkansas
,
https://www.space.com/37535-mars-160-ar … egins.html

'Gateway' ending Mars-Direct? just as they wanted a space station before getting to Mars a long time ago
What does it share with the original SEI by Bush senior

https://web.archive.org/web/20040304052 … ummary.htm

On July 20, 1989 President George H. W. Bush announced plans for the Space Exploration Initiative (SEI). On the 20th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission, Bush delivered a speech on the steps of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum calling for construction of the Space Station Freedom, sending humans back to the Moon, and ultimately sending astronauts to Mars. In announcing his plans Bush specifically invoked history and exploration: “From the voyages of Columbus – to the Oregon Trail – to the journey to the Moon itself – history proves that we have never lost by pressing the limits of our frontiers.” He noted that in 1961 it took a crisis to accelerate the civilian space program, and that he was acting in 1989 not impelled by crisis but to seize an opportunity in the best tradition of American history. He proposed not a 10-year Apollo-style plan, but a long-range continuing commitment based on the three above elements, ending with “a journey into tomorrow – a journey to another planet – a manned mission to Mars.” The President noted it was humanity’s destiny to explore, and America’s destiny to lead. He ended by asking Vice President Quayle to lead the National Space Council in determining what was needed to carry out these missions in terms of money, manpower and technology.

90 Day Study
http://www.astronautix.com/9/90daystudy.html

Study 1989.
To provide alternates for presidential consideration, NASA management completed a 90-day study in October 1989. This estimated the cost of going to Mars as $ 258 billion (including $141 billion contingency). The plan used the then-current collection of planned NASA infrastructure hardware - Space Station Freedom, Orbital Transfer Vehicles, aerobraking to accomplish the mission.
One result of the Ride Report was the Space Exploration Initiative. As part of this an Outreach Program solicited competing ideas from industry, government labs, NASA centers, and academia. This produced a large number of conflicting ideas. NASA's vision of the future was embodied in its 90-day study. But other players were making the their voices heard at the White House, including Lawrence Livermore Laboratory with a plan for a quick, cheap landing using inflatable technology, and Los Alamos National Laboratory with a call for a return to the nuclear thermal technology of the 1960's.

What Can We Learn from a Failed Return to the Moon?
https://www.planetary.org/articles/lessons-of-sei
In Mars Wars (full book PDF), author Thor Hogan examines the rise and fall of SEI and provides invaluable context for this discussion. My thoughts below accept and build upon Dr. Hogan's analysis. A conversation with Mark Albrecht, the executive secretary of the National Space Council during the Space Exploration Initiative, also informed my thinking. You can listen to this discussion in the May 3rd, 2019 episode of Planetary Radio: Space Policy Edition.

Dr. Hogan states that the failure of SEI was not inevitable. Mistakes were made, as the saying goes, by both NASA and the White House leadership. We face the same situation now. Returning astronauts to the Moon by 2024 is possible, but there are many more paths leading to failure than success. Looking back at SEI can help us avoid some pitfalls, and perhaps increase the odds of finding the right way forward.

'Sciency Words: The 90-Day Report'
https://planetpailly.com/2019/07/26/sci … ay-report/

It was July 20, 1989—the 20th anniversary of the Moon Landing—when President George H.W. Bush announced America’s intention to return to the Moon and establish a permanent presence there.

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2023-03-10 12:40:51)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-03-15 18:28:47

The big reveal: What's ahead in returning samples from Mars?

https://www.space.com/mars-sample-return-whats-ahead

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-08-22 19:06:26

Boffins reckon Mars colony could survive with fewer than two dozen people

https://www.theregister.com/2023/08/16/ … lony_size/

In an email to The Register, Salotti wrote, "Twenty-two is in fact compatible with my 110 as different problems are addressed. Twenty-two is acceptable when shipments from Earth are possible for resupply. It might even be lower. The problem with this kind of approach is that the results highly depend on the set of parameters, which are arbitrary."

'Less than two dozen' people needed

Survival, metabolic activity, and ultrastructural damages of Antarctic black fungus in perchlorates media

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10 … 92077/full

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#51 2017-10-13 15:08:17

Re: Mars Direct; are we now beating a dead horse?

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#56 2017-10-13 21:14:40

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#57 2017-10-14 04:22:38

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#58 2017-10-14 04:39:02

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#59 2017-10-14 10:52:16

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#60 2017-10-14 15:30:12

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#63 2021-05-28 05:51:43

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#64 2021-05-28 12:54:31

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#65 2021-06-01 09:16:29

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