Star date: 04:26:99

Mars... The Next Step

The human race has just begun to explore what will become the last frontier.

As it stands right now, we have two physical frontiers left: the depths of the ocean, and the expanses of space. Although we do not yet know what kinds of mysteries await us at the bottom of the oceans, the oceans will almost certainly be long explored before we even venture to the nearest star.

Our robot explorers have now traveled slightly beyond the confines of our family of planets, but they are not anywhere near even the nearest star, nor are they even headed in that direction. These four spacecraft (Voyagers 1 and 2 as well as the earlier Pioneers 1 and 2), although they are among the fastest objects ever produced by the human race, will not enter the company of other stars for dozens of thousands of years.

Humans have never ventured beyond the Moon in person. But what will the next step be in our exploration of the immensity of space? Mercury is far too hot on its day side for easy visiting, as any spacecraft landing there would likely quickly melt in the heat. The nightime side of Mercury has just the opposite problem, where it would quickly freeze any electronic components aboard a spacecraft. Venus is hotter still, quickly melting even lead on it's surface. The crushing pressures and sulfuric acid rain on Venus do not help a potential human mission there at all either. The planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are all gas giants presenting little to no solid surface for any person brave enough to go there to land upon. Pluto is much too far away to present an easy target. Therefore, with the possible exception of certain sattelites of the planets, this leaves only Mars as a possible target for human habitation.

Mars has also long fascinated the human race, perhaps due to its bright blood red color. It is no suprise that both the Ancient Greeks and the Romans associated Mars with their respective Gods of war. Mars has about 1/2 the equatorial diameter as the Earth, and contains about 10% of the mass of the Earth. This results in a surface gravity of about 40% of the gravity as the Earth. Compared with the Earth, Mars revolves around the Sun at about one and a half times the distance which the Earth does. This results in a Mars year being about 88% longer then the Earth, or about 687 days. Any future rocket bases on Mars will be more efficient than those of Earth due to the fact that the escape velocity from Mars is only about 5km (3 1/8 miles) per second. This means that any spacecraft taking off from Mars will need to carry far less fuel than the same spacecraft taking off from the Earth. Since most of the weight of any rocket is fuel, this will make quite a difference. In fact, soon there will be spacecraft going to Mars without any fuel to get back to Earth.

Using a well known 19th century chemistry principle, these spacecraft will use material they find on Mars to produce fuel for the trip back home. Several people and organizations are currently working on producing technology to overcome the challenges of a trip to Mars. The fact that the atmosphere of Mars is thin and mostly carbon dioxide is one of the challenges facing us, as is the fact that the temperatures on Mars range from -140 to -20 degrees C (-220 to -68 F). We certainly need to plan for this, but it is not a problem which cannot be overcome with enough time and clever ideas. Another challenge facing us is the projected 2 year round trip time for a trip to Mars. With the new generation of ion drives currently being tested, we can lower the round trip time for a Mars trip to around six months.

Look for Mars in the southeast sky this week around 9pm. You will find it just a few degrees east of southeast and 18 degrees above the horizon at this time. It will be just 9 degrees away from one of the brightest stars in the sky, Spica.

View the Mars Rover movie

Clear skies, and good viewing.

"Understanding is joyous" - Carl Sagan

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