who will be the first to go to Mars?

[damienpaul]

here is a question for you all, who do you think will be the ones to conduct a manned mission to Mars? and when do you think it'd be?

[Littlemews]

USA, Russia, China and Australia either one of them might have the chance to land on Mars....maybe 2015, 2030 or maybe 2100

See "Rocket Man" The Movie :lol: :lol: :lol:

[tycho1981]

It's me :P

[Chook]

For the next ten years I'd rather comfortably travel to Canada and enjoy a steaming hot Hungarian Goulash with You-Know-Who.

If ANYONE should volunteer to step onto Mars - I propose pressure be placed on Asam bin Laden to step forward.

;)

[kashi]

I don't think Australia has much of a chance Littlemews. Our GDP isn't big enough to pay for it.

[damienpaul]

fraser will pay methinks!!!! or chook!

[Chook]

I offered some funds to Fraser but he wouldn't take it :( .

[damienpaul]

yes of course you did chook..... the USS Fraser will launch one day

[jkmccrann]

Before 2020, it could only be the USA, surely, and only if the Chinese started making it clear that's where they're going! Nothing like a little bit of competition. Much as I'd like to agree with you Littlemews


USA, Russia, China and Australia either one of them might have the chance to land on Mars....maybe 2015, 2030 or maybe 2100

See "Rocket Man" The Movie :lol: :lol: :lol:


as an Australian, I'd have to put the chances of that at 0. No ifs and no buts. People here simply aren't the least bit interested in space (in general of course, there are obviously many notable exceptions on these very boards) And I can tell you if any Australian politician made any effort to advocate space it would be complete political suicide for the poor fellow, unless he could somehow link it to terrorism, because at the moment there're always votes in terrorism and vanquishing terrorists etc.

But back to topic, I actually would be surprised if anyone got there by 2020, I think looking through very rose-tinted glasses we're looking at at least 2030 for a Martian mission unfortunately. About the time Ukraine joins the EU perhaps.

[Ilya]

No earlier than 2100, and it will be a private effort. No country, China included, is simply dedicated enough as a society to the manned spaceflight.

Also, I give at least 40% chance that first people to step on Mars will have genetic modifications for space. I am not talking about anything as extreme as surviving indefinitely in vacuum, but things like resistance to lung overexpansion (in rapid decompression event) and greatly increased ability to store oxygen in tissues.

[cyswxman]

I've been asked if I'm from there. :shifty:

[The Mangler]

What would the travel time be?

[cyswxman]

I seem to remember that, using current rocket-style propulsion, it would be on the order of 6-8 months, one-way.

[The Mangler]

In that case, I don't think a manned mission to Mars would be possible untill someone invents some new type of propulsion.

[ASEI]

What would the travel time be? Depending on your propulsion system, and how much fuel you want to launch, anywhere from 8 months (chemical, hohman) to 2 months (very high powered, snazzy nuclear electric or nuclear thermal type drives).

[The Mangler]

The longer the flight was the more supplies you would have to bring (food, water, oxygen...), and that would add weight. How much weight, I don't know. But if it was enough, you would need more power. I don't know if we could do it at our present tech level. Or maybe we have more advanced stuff & better capabilities than I know about...?

[rahuldandekar]

A mars mission will be dangerous and long. I agree with Mangler, unless some new technologies are invented, we cannot risk our astronauts. the moon is one thing, Mars is another. It is just too far for now.

And why manned missions? Isn't sending robots enough? I mean, that's my view, sending robots is less dangerous.

[Tim Thompson]

I don't think there is any real technical problem getting people to Mars right now, we know how to do that. We just pre-position a bunch of cargo haulers in orbit around Mars with food, water, Texas Toast & etc. We could even pre-position a space station type thing. But, of course, that all costs a lot of $$$.

Flight times to Mars have ranged from 6 months to a year, depending on where Earth and Mars are relative to each other, and depending on the mass of the spacecraft (which determines how fast our limited propulsion can push it). But those are all one-way missions. I assume that any peopled mission to Mars would carry the assumption that we expect everyone who goes to Mars, to also come back from Mars. You can't just go there, turn around and come back. Not only are Earth & Mars not well positioned for that, but why would anybody go to all the effort to get there, and not even hang around for a peek? So I think it's fair to assume that, at a minimum, any peopled mission to Mars will last 2-3 years, maybe longer.

We do have some experience with people under such conditions. Back in the "golden" age of exploration, which was not so golden for the 50% or so of the crews who did not survive the trips, it took maybe 30 days to get from Europe to the wild and savage coast of North America. They made it, but not comfortably. In modern times, various navies have continued the tradition of long & silent voyages, with secret submarines, and not so secret aircarft carriers trolling around the open oceans for as long as 6 months without sight of land, or coming to surface. The South Pole Station (http://www.southpolestation.com/) is isolated for about 9 months. So we know that small numbers of people can survive close confinement without going nuts, if some care is exercised in who those people are.

And who would those people be? All tough guy military officer astronauts? guys & gals together? Amercians? Will a conservative, Republican, American administration send unmarried couples to Mars? There are real social & political issues involved in choosing an appropriately diverse & integrated crew that leaves behind no representative of the free peoples of the world, and all of their free ideas!

But all of this can be done. All we need to do is find about 1000 Mars-o-Nauts, build an aircraft carrier in Earth orbit for them to fly to Mars, pre-position a few hundred (or few thousand?) tons of useful stuff around Mars, and Mars-Ho! Indeed, I think that the President of the United States of America (http://www.whitehouse.gov/), bold visionary, forward thinker, and inspring leader of the free world, could set an example for the rest of us and lead the way to Mars! I would have no problem putting him at the front of the ship.

But I don't think the printing presses of the world can print that much money, no matter how hard they try. Cheers.

[Kaptain K]

...we cannot risk our astronauts.
Who are we to determine what risk others are allowed to take? Have we become so risk averse as a society that we set ourselves up as the arbiters of the risk that others are allowed to take? Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins were told that there was a less than 50% chance that they would make it back and were given the chance to back out gracefully. None did.
Even a one-way trip to Mars would have no shortage of volunteers, just to go down in history as "the first to stand on Mars"!

[ASEI]

Have we become so risk averse as a society that we set ourselves up as the arbiters of the risk that others are allowed to take? Unfortunately, yes. These days, space officials debate about whether or not the radiation on the moon constitutes an unacceptable risk for human missions!

[Kaptain K]

Sad, isn't it?

[The Mangler]

I don't think we should go around sending people on suicide missions, but nothing will ever be accomplished without some risk.

[The Mangler]

I read somewhere that we are more technically able to go to mars right now than we were to go to the moon when jfk said that we will send a man to the moon. We just don't have the determination to get it done right now.

[ASEI]

New idea - let the astronauts decide what an acceptable level of risk is - Have them assess the radiation risks, or the vehicle failure risks, ect.