Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

Palomar · 2003-12-20 16:43:21

*Of course this is the New Mars Ikonboard and our discussions basically center on Mars. *Besides* the Red Planet, what other fantasy/ies regarding the Solar System/Cosmos do you most relish?

Particularly, where would you like to go if you could (physically -- you're there), what would you like most to see?

My most fond daydream is to be standing behind a protected, shielded glass in a dugout building on Mercury, looking at the sun from so close.

Flying to Saturn and taking a tour of the rings would be fantastic; especially as the days progress with Saturn and its rings looming larger and closer. And since I'd be in the neighborhood, I'd like to stop and look over Iapetus and Titan.

I'd like to be present when the first probe on Europa drills into the ocean believed to exist beneath its icy crust, searching for evidence of life.

Then I'd skip over in my spacecraft and circle Io for a day or two (yeah, I know...Jupiter's megalethal radiation belts...this is a fantasy after all), watching its volcanic activity in real-time, as it happens.

You?

--Cindy (I don't ask for much, huh)? :;):

Rxke · 2003-12-21 01:57:12

Slowly coming down towards Mars, by space-elevator... No *That* would be cool...

And visiting a planet in a more central part of our Milky Way... You'd see much more stars than on earth...

Palomar · 2003-12-21 09:09:06

And visiting a planet in a more central part of our Milky Way... You'd see much more stars than on earth...

*Rik, your response brought this to mind (from the archives of Astropix):

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap031213.html

Nifty...

--Cindy

kippy · 2003-12-21 11:24:29

I'd rather be traveling up a space elevator from Earth. A space elevator would be the fastest way to setteling space by far and would open up the solar system to anyone who cared to pay a few thousand dollars.

~Eternal~ · 2003-12-21 12:54:36

Making Rust-Angles on the Martian surface!
Seriously.

Byron · 2003-12-21 16:20:10

Here's where I'd like to go...(not counting Mars, of course...lol)

First stop - the Moon. Yeah, it's close and familiar. But wouldn't it be just the coolest thing to stand on the rim of a deep crater, looking at the planet Earth in the sky above you?

Stop Number 2 - One of the major asteroids...if not Ceres, one of the other biggies. It'd be fun to see how far you could go simply by jumping and bouncing....lol..

No.3 - Jupiter. Not just around it, but actually in it. I want to be able to race in and around the awsome cloud decks of Jupiter's upper atmosphere, pause for a moment to experience two and a half times Earth gravity (ouch!), and then play "hurricane hunter" in the Great Red Spot with its stupendous winds.

No.4 - Titan. I'm just dying to see what's under those thick cloud decks of this amazing world...it's a mystery world if there ever was one...lol. It'd be a bit chilly and dim for sure, but the possibility of seeing a lake or an ocean of a liquid substance that's not water would be a pretty nifty thing to see.

B

Aetius · 2003-12-21 16:43:07

I'd love to have a large fleet of colonizer spacecraft propelled by neutral particle beam generators all the way to the Gliese 876 solar system. It's got a dim M4 red dwarf parent star, and two gas giant planets.

The outer gas giant is twice the size of Jupiter, so I'd bet a nickel it's got at least one Galilean-analog moon. If I'm lucky, since the planet's twice the size of Jupiter, maybe its largest moon is twice the size of Ganymede also! (So much world to strip mine...drool...) Maybe it's actually big enough to be a Mars analog world!

The inner gas giant is half the size of Jupiter, and (like the gas giants in our own Sol) probably has vast amounts of Helium-3 thermonuclear fuel. The He-3 could be mined with the NIFT vehicles Zubrin discussed in "Entering Space", providing the colonists with limitless amounts of energy. (Hey, this is my fantasy, so Deuterium/Helium-3 controlled fusion will be available to my settlers. )

The fleet would rendezvous with Kuiper Belt-class objects (should they exist) upon arrival in the Gl 876 system. Robots would mine the comet-like objects for their mineral wealth. Next comes processing the native resources into useful building materials. Finally, use them to repair, replace, and upgrade the industrial and transportation infrastructure. Note that all of this preliminary work would preferably occur outside the gravity well of the two giants. If it can't be done, then heavy shuttlecraft will have to be brought from Earth. In the absence of Kuiper objects, all of the initial industrial focus would have to shift to the big moon of the outer giant.

Once landing ships and an adequate colonizing infrastructure have been manufactured from asteroidal and cometary materials, then the large scale settlement of the biggest moon of the outer giant (Gl 876B1) can begin.

The first generations of colonists might have to suffice with nuclear fission reactors using local radiogenic materials. Eventually, however, the NIFT (Nuclear Indigenous Fueled Transatmospheric) vehicles and the He-3 mining infrastructure would be complete. The inner giant, with its lower mass, is perfect for this kind of resource extraction.

Do I have lengthy fantasies or what?

Aetius · 2003-12-21 16:59:19

Sorry I was a bit off-topic. If my fantasy was restricted to simply SEEING something, I'd love to visit the moons of the extrasolar planets Gl 876B and Gl 876C.

They're less than 16 light-years away.

Josh Cryer · 2003-12-21 17:23:07

I think it'd be really great to float in the clouds of Venus in large dirigibles, even if you couldn't really see much.

I like the Mercury idea. That'd be freaking awesome.

And the moon is one of those places where one can optimitically see themselves being able to access.

If Europa really is liquid underneath, it'd be the ultimate deep sea dive. Can you even imagine what it'd be like to be in a submarine floating in a dropplett of water in space? I can't.

I like Aetius' post the most, though. I think he has a nice vision. It'd be awesome to escape the solar system in search of unseen planets or habitats.

Mad Grad Student · 2003-12-21 19:33:19

My most fond daydream is to be standing behind a protected, shielded glass in a dugout building on Mercury, looking at the sun from so close.

Yeah, you'll need those sunglasses on Mercury. The Mercury fantasy brings to mind a quote form the movie Pi "When I was a little kid, my mom always told me not to look into the sun, so one time when I was six I did." He's temporarily blinded and, well, you'd have to see the movie to get the significance. Anyway, here's my list of interplanetary getaways.

#1: Von Braun City, Delos, Tau Ceti: This is the ficticious planet from the "What if the Event Never Happened" forum. Von Braun City would be a small setelment near the equator with a nearby beach filled to the brim with stromotolites. The beginings of the first tropical rain forest (Brought with the colonists) is sprouting up outside the farmlands, and perhaps the best part about the planet is that all you have to pack is a toothbrush and some casual clothes. The atmosphere is 27% oxygen, with a thick ozone layer, so you can run around all you want outside wihtout a spacesuit!

#2: Titan, Saturn system: Who wouldn't want to go to a moon where there's plenty of beachside real estate, a thick atmosphere for airplanes, and you loose 75% of your weight just for going?! Seriously, I'd love to see Saturn suspended above those orange clouds while standing on the shore of the systems only other ocean. The fact that airplanes get along there too is fine by me, I couldn't stand being seperate from the ability to fly for too long (See my intersts).

#3: Olympus Mons, Mars (5976 AD): This would be one of the first cities on a terraformed Mars 5,000 years from now (Hey, I can dream can't I!). The city is located by the shore of the Atlantic Ocean (Some Italian astronomer named it that back in the 1800s and apparently no one switched it in 5,000 years) on the foothills of Olympus Mons, enriched by fresh volcanic soil. The failure to find any life on Mars during the initial exploration in the 21st century actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise, exempting Mars from the ban on terraforming of any planet with indiginous life passed in 2027. Terraforming was not easy, and took forever, but it did gave us a second Earth. This one gets #3 just on basic coolness factor.

#4: Hadley City, Moon, Terran system. This would be one of the first Lunar colonies, tucked away in Hadley Rile (Hence the name). Located near the foothills of the lunar Alps, you can enjoy activities ranging from golfing (A long par 5 is 10,000 yds) to 6th-g skateboarding (The newest X-treme sport) to hiking in the Alps. There's even a historical landmark at the Apollo 15 landing site.

Palomar · 2003-12-21 20:17:39

*Hey, great answers. I forgot one (geez...I must be stressed from the holidays coming): Flying to Antares (my favorite; a red giant star -- the alpha star in Scorpius), seeing it and its tiny green binary companion up close!

--Cindy

Mad Grad Student · 2003-12-22 19:37:24

I just thought of another cool off-planet destination that also involves Mercury. Personally, a giant sun doesn't singularly qualify a planet to be on my top ten list, but Mercury has another thing going for it, it's tiny whisp of an atmosphere and slow rotational speed makes it a great place to see the stars. Imagine going there during a total plaentary lineup like that which occured back in 1977, I believe. From one point you could see Mercury, Venus, Earth, the Moon, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn! With reasonably good binoculars, you could also see the Galilean moons, Uranus, and maybe even Phobos. Additionally, you'd get the most brilliant stars ever seen, probably around five times as many as even perfect conditions on Earth (Ie night the Titanic sank, no wind, no moon).

That would probably be my #5.

Shaun Barrett · 2003-12-24 17:57:53

I would like to see all the Al Qa'eda leadership taken into Low Earth Orbit so they could look down at our beautiful blue planet.
I want them to see what the astronauts often talk about. I want them to see a world with no visible evidence of political boundaries, where we all depend on Earth's bounty for our survival and on each other for a peaceful life.
Maybe they'd come away from that with a different point of view(?).

Rxke · 2003-12-24 18:05:32

YES! YES! YES! Shaun...

That's one of my daydreams... All world-country-fiefdom-big corporation-...leaders should take a trip Out There, to see what they're 'ruling'.... give them a new perspective of things. (litteraly)

Mad Grad Student · 2003-12-25 13:28:28

Well, it currently is Christmas, so it might be a bit late to post wishes. Maybe some other holiday hasn't happened yet (Quanza anyone?) that I can wish for stuff on. Anyway, two more additions, one semi-realistic, and one that's not.

First, a very nice present would be a Martain lander three-peat. Wouldn't it be great if Beagle, Spirit, and Opportunity all make it down okay? I hope to see at least two work, here's hoping Mars Express picks up Beagle's dial tone in a few hours. Even if it failed, we still have the two MER's to count on, but I don't think we can count Beagle out just yet.

A much wilder solar system trip would be to explore Triton, Neptune's biggest moon. I've never seen geysers or a volcano in person on Earth, but both of those exist on Trition, with a twist. It's so cold there that geysers spurt up liquid nitrogen and volcnoes erupt blocks of ice! Triton is the coldest object in the solar system yet examined up close, with a surface temperature hovering at a chilly 20 degrees Farenhiet above absolute zero. I beleive a Pop Tarts commercial said it best "It's so cool, it's hot!"

Gennaro · 2003-12-28 12:11:36

I'm surprised no one has mentioned it, but that's maybe because it's so obvious. I really, really, really want to go to Alpha Centauri and see what's there. Both the A and B star, class G2 and K0 respectively, are prime candidates for life and/or settlement. At their closest approach, at the distance of Saturn in the solar system, they are still expected to maintain stable planetary orbits, perhaps each having a planetary system similar to the inner system of Sol.

As for intersolar destinations, I agree with a lot of the above, particularly to see what's under the ice of Europa and under the atmosphere of Titan.

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#1 2003-12-20 16:43:21

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#2 2003-12-21 01:57:12

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#3 2003-12-21 09:09:06

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#4 2003-12-21 11:24:29

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#5 2003-12-21 12:54:36

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#6 2003-12-21 16:20:10

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#7 2003-12-21 16:43:07

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#8 2003-12-21 16:59:19

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#9 2003-12-21 17:23:07

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#10 2003-12-21 19:33:19

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#11 2003-12-21 20:17:39

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#12 2003-12-22 19:37:24

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#13 2003-12-24 17:57:53

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#14 2003-12-24 18:05:32

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#15 2003-12-25 13:28:28

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

#16 2003-12-28 12:11:36

Re: Holiday Wish List - ...Cosmic Style

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