Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works, and I heart radio and I love
Speaker 1: all things tech. And in our last episode, I talked
Speaker 1: about NASA's Insight Lander, which is taking a lot of
Speaker 1: measurements on Mars and it's all about helping us unlock
Speaker 1: the secret of how rocky planets in general are formed
Speaker 1: and Mars in particular, as well as other details about
Speaker 1: the Red planets, sort of like a hey, what's what's
Speaker 1: your core made out of? Man? I see you've been
Speaker 1: working on your core. Well, today I want to talk
Speaker 1: about the various proposed missions to Mars that would see
Speaker 1: people human beings set foot on the planet and what
Speaker 1: that would require to make it successful and not a terrible,
Speaker 1: terrible mistake. And let me tell you it's gonna require
Speaker 1: a lot, y'all. Mars, as it turns out, wants to
Speaker 1: kill you. Well, I guess it doesn't really want anything,
Speaker 1: but conditions on Mars are not particularly suited towards supporting life,
Speaker 1: specifically not supporting human life. So let's go down the
Speaker 1: list of what's going on over at Mars, so we
Speaker 1: can identify the challenges we have to overcome if we're
Speaker 1: to ever land there and survive the experience. So the
Speaker 1: first thing we can get of what out of the
Speaker 1: way is something I talked about in the last episode,
Speaker 1: and that's how far away Mars is from us. The
Speaker 1: Moon is about two nine thousand miles from Earth or
Speaker 1: about three thousand five kilometers, which is a pretty good job.
Speaker 1: But we can get there in a few days. As
Speaker 1: proven by the Apollo lunar missions. Mars is much much
Speaker 1: further away, and the distance changes throughout the year between
Speaker 1: Earth and Mars because both planets are on their own
Speaker 1: orbits around the Sun, as opposed to the Moon, which
Speaker 1: obviously orbits the Earth, so the distance you must travel
Speaker 1: depends upon the respective orbits of the two planets. There
Speaker 1: is a launch window that represents the lowest amount of
Speaker 1: energy required to get from Earth to Mars, and that
Speaker 1: window comes around every couple of years, so you have
Speaker 1: time to plan out your mission, and you want to
Speaker 1: time it just right to minimize the amount of energy
Speaker 1: you're going to need to get there. That minimizes the
Speaker 1: amount of fuel you have to carry two Mars, and
Speaker 1: once you're on Mars you should pretty much wait around
Speaker 1: for the next launch window in order to get back
Speaker 1: using the minimum amount of energy needed, because the more
Speaker 1: energy you required to make the trip, the harder it's
Speaker 1: going to be to do. You know, you're gonna have
Speaker 1: to carry more fuel, it's going to be more expensive,
Speaker 1: you have to design bigger spacecraft. So these things matter
Speaker 1: more on that a little bit. Next, the atmosphere. So
Speaker 1: Mars has an atmosphere. Ya, that's a good thing, but
Speaker 1: it's not like Earth's atmosphere. Earth's atmosphere is a cocktail
Speaker 1: made up of about seventy eight percent nitrogen, twenty one
Speaker 1: percent oxygen, and then a bunch of other gases in
Speaker 1: very small amounts, like argone and carbon dioxide. Mars's atmosphere
Speaker 1: is about nine five three percent carbon dioxide. The atmosphere
Speaker 1: is only two point seven percent nitrogen and only about
Speaker 1: point one three percent oxygen. There's also very little water
Speaker 1: vapor in Mars's atmosphere. It has a point zero three
Speaker 1: percent water vapor, whereas on Earth it's closer to one percent.
Speaker 1: So we're not talking about a breathable atmosphere. Mars also
Speaker 1: has a much thinner atmosphere than Earth does, and there's
Speaker 1: not much atmospheric pressure i they're On average, the atmosphere
Speaker 1: exerts about six point one mill of bars of pressure
Speaker 1: on the surface of Mars. On Earth, the average sea
Speaker 1: level atmospheric pressure is one thousand, thirteen point to five
Speaker 1: mill of bars six point one compared to one thousand,
Speaker 1: thirteen point to five. That is a huge difference, though
Speaker 1: you could argue some of that difference also comes down
Speaker 1: to Mars's gravitational pull, which is about point three eight
Speaker 1: times that of Earth's, so you would be lighter on Mars,
Speaker 1: you know, you'd be more than more than half as light. Also,
Speaker 1: air pressure changes on Mars throughout the year. During the
Speaker 1: Martian summer, the Sun's heat will start to heat up
Speaker 1: frozen carbon dioxide which is at the polar ice caps
Speaker 1: on the Martian poles, and the frozen carbon dioxide will
Speaker 1: begin to sublime. That means it will convert directly from
Speaker 1: solid form into a gas us and so the atmosphere's
Speaker 1: carbon dioxide content will increase, which means the atmospheric pressure
Speaker 1: will also increase by a whole two milo bars. That's
Speaker 1: still a tiny amount of pressure, but it is a
Speaker 1: significant increase when you're looking at an average of just
Speaker 1: six point one mela bars. In the winter, carbon dioxide
Speaker 1: in the atmosphere will start to freeze at the polar
Speaker 1: ice caps, and you will even see carbon dioxide snow,
Speaker 1: which is kind of wild. The low atmospheric pressure and
Speaker 1: temperatures means that liquid water does not exist on the
Speaker 1: surface of Mars. Liquid water would either freeze because of
Speaker 1: the temperature or evaporate because of the very low air pressure,
Speaker 1: and it would just depend upon the local conditions at
Speaker 1: that time. And since we humans rely heavily on water,
Speaker 1: that's one of the things we would have to deal
Speaker 1: with if we were to go to Mars. There is
Speaker 1: water on Mars, but not really in liquid format, so
Speaker 1: we would have to extract the water from various Martian
Speaker 1: environments in some way and process it in order to
Speaker 1: make use of it. And we would absolutely have to
Speaker 1: do that if we wanted to stay there for any
Speaker 1: real length of time and keep our water supply to
Speaker 1: a level that can sustain life. You could recycle water,
Speaker 1: and in fact, we see this done a lot in
Speaker 1: space missions like the International Space Station. They're really good
Speaker 1: at recapturing water and reusing it. But even so you're
Speaker 1: gonna lose some through various means, so it's good to
Speaker 1: have a way of replenishing that in the Martians spring.
Speaker 1: In summer, the sun heats up the atmosphere of Mars
Speaker 1: enough to cause convection currents or wind. Sometimes that wind
Speaker 1: gets pretty gusty despite the very thin atmosphere, and it
Speaker 1: can blow hard enough to start picking up dust particles
Speaker 1: and blowing them around. Uh, it does have to be
Speaker 1: a pretty strong wind. Because there is so little atmosphere,
Speaker 1: it's tough for the atmosphere to move the dust. So
Speaker 1: to stir up dust clouds it takes winds traveling at
Speaker 1: speeds of around six any miles per hour or one
Speaker 1: two hundred kilometers per hour. These dust storms can last
Speaker 1: for months and spread across enormous regions across the surface
Speaker 1: of Mars. So we would likely be at least partly
Speaker 1: reliant on solar power for any sort of human presence
Speaker 1: on Mars. So this is another challenge because if there's
Speaker 1: a really bad dust storm, you're not going to get
Speaker 1: very much solar exposure to your solar panels, so you
Speaker 1: have to have enough energy storage systems there to get
Speaker 1: you through any long periods where you have limited to
Speaker 1: no solar access. You also have to have a way
Speaker 1: of clearing those solar panels if they get covered in dust.
Speaker 1: So we may not be able to depend upon the
Speaker 1: sun as the sole means of generating electricity, and in fact,
Speaker 1: a lot of the proposals I see suggest bringing along
Speaker 1: other types of sources for generating electricity, like nuclear power
Speaker 1: plants for example portable ones. Also that thin air presents
Speaker 1: more challenge is than just breathing. For one thing. As
Speaker 1: I said in the last episode, it really makes it
Speaker 1: hard to slow your spacecraft down as you're descending to
Speaker 1: the planet from outer space. The atmosphere is thick enough
Speaker 1: to present thermal problems as you come in at high speeds,
Speaker 1: because your spacecraft will compress the air in front of it,
Speaker 1: and that will cause the temperature of the surface of
Speaker 1: your craft to climb quickly. So you'll need to get
Speaker 1: some good heat shielding on your entry craft. But the
Speaker 1: atmosphere is so thin that a parachute is not nearly
Speaker 1: as effective as it would be on Earth. It will
Speaker 1: slow you down a little bit, but not as much
Speaker 1: as you would need and not as much as it
Speaker 1: would in Earth's deliciously soupy atmosphere, so you'll need some
Speaker 1: sort of other method like retrorockets on your landing craft
Speaker 1: to keep things from getting too rough on arrival. The
Speaker 1: thin atmosphere also means Mars doesn't hold on to heat
Speaker 1: from the sun very effectively, even though that thin atmosphere
Speaker 1: is almost entirely made up of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.
Speaker 1: The temperature on Mars can vary by as much as
Speaker 1: a hundred degrees fahrenheit or sixty degrees celsius in a day,
Speaker 1: So how the heck do you dress for that weather? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I thought Georgia was bad, and we're not done yet.
Speaker 1: The soil itself on Mars is a problem. You may
Speaker 1: have heard that on Earth where developing soil that's meant
Speaker 1: to mimic that of Mars. You can actually buy this stuff.
Speaker 1: I think it's like ten bucks a pound. So this
Speaker 1: is typically called simulant, and simulant is intended for use
Speaker 1: and experiments that could lead to developing techniques for growing
Speaker 1: food crops on Martian soil, for example, or using Martian
Speaker 1: soil in other ways, like as part of a way
Speaker 1: of creating construction material. It's another uh necessity for any
Speaker 1: mission to Mars with humans is being able to grow
Speaker 1: stuff once you get to Mars, because if you're gonna
Speaker 1: be on the planet for a couple of years, chances
Speaker 1: are you're not going to be able to carry all
Speaker 1: of the food you're going to need for that time
Speaker 1: along with you. You just won't have the cargo capacity.
Speaker 1: It would be better if you could bring stuff that
Speaker 1: you could plant and grow at your destination. It would
Speaker 1: take up less space and you would become sufficient on
Speaker 1: the planet. Also, plants generate oxygen, so that would be good,
Speaker 1: So simulants are good for running those kind of experiments. However,
Speaker 1: simulants tend to leave out the stuff in Martian soil
Speaker 1: that's really harmful to humans. Makes sense, you don't want
Speaker 1: to put human lives at risk while you're running these experiments.
Speaker 1: But actually on Mars it's a different story. You have
Speaker 1: stuff like perchlorate chemicals, so in high concentrations such as
Speaker 1: what you would find in Martian soil, that stuff is
Speaker 1: toxic to humans. The good news is it's also a
Speaker 1: common component of rocket fuel, so maybe you could use
Speaker 1: stuff on Mars to help manufacture the fuel you would
Speaker 1: need for a return trip to Earth, but you would
Speaker 1: also need to figure out a way to thoroughly clean
Speaker 1: any component that was to pass from the surface of
Speaker 1: Mars into an inhabited area, as particles of that dust
Speaker 1: could be deadly to humans. The percolorates could have other uses,
Speaker 1: like manufacturing oxygen, but we would have to be very
Speaker 1: clever in how we manage our interactions with the Martian
Speaker 1: regulars to avoid the possibility of contaminating any habitats. Uh.
Speaker 1: The stuff can really mess up thyroids, for example. So
Speaker 1: even the dirt on Mars is trying to kill you.
Speaker 1: But wait, there's more. I'll explain in just a moment,
Speaker 1: But first let's take a quick break to thank our sponsor.
Speaker 1: All Right, So the atmosphere on Mars cannot support life.
Speaker 1: There's no liquid water to be found on the planet.
Speaker 1: The soil itself will kill you. And then there's radiation.
Speaker 1: So on Earth, our atmosphere and the Earth's magnetic field
Speaker 1: or the magnetosphere protect us from the most harmful radiation
Speaker 1: that comes from the Sun and other sources stuff like
Speaker 1: cosmic rays. But as we've mentioned, the Martian atmosphere is
Speaker 1: not so thick, and the planet has a very weak
Speaker 1: magnetic field, so there isn't much protection against radiation. Also,
Speaker 1: the trip to Mars would take months, as we mentioned earlier,
Speaker 1: and during that time you would be on a space
Speaker 1: ship and potentially exposed to incredible amounts of radiation, like
Speaker 1: fifteen times more than the annual radiation limit we put
Speaker 1: in place for people who work at nuclear power plants.
Speaker 1: So the Curiosity Rover, when it was traveling from Earth
Speaker 1: to Mars, monitored how much radiation it was it was
Speaker 1: subjected to as it went through that trip, and it
Speaker 1: accumulated the equivalent radiation of twenty four cat scans on
Speaker 1: the duryation of that trip. Oh, and that long trip
Speaker 1: could also cause other problems, not just the radiation. The
Speaker 1: micro gravity, the fact that you are quote unquote weightless
Speaker 1: in space can lead to stuff like loss of bone
Speaker 1: density as well as loss of of muscle tissue. So
Speaker 1: some proposed plans of sending humans to Mars include a
Speaker 1: method of generating artificial gravity, typically by spinning the spacecraft
Speaker 1: so that you have this centripetal force thing going on
Speaker 1: that you would kind of fake gravity, But that also
Speaker 1: has challenges associated with it. A big one being that
Speaker 1: if your spacecraft is not large enough, then the the
Speaker 1: radius of rotation it will be so different between your
Speaker 1: feet and your head that probably messy up big time,
Speaker 1: Like it would be very difficult to move around and
Speaker 1: and adapt to that kind of environment. So even creating
Speaker 1: artificial gravity has its own challenges. Cosmic radiation and solar
Speaker 1: particles could continue to cause real problems on the surface
Speaker 1: of Mars even after you've gotten off the spacecraft. The
Speaker 1: threat of radiation is such that exobiologists, as to say,
Speaker 1: scientists who are studying the possibility of life on other
Speaker 1: celestial bodies, have suggested that if any organics still exist
Speaker 1: on Mars, assuming they ever did exist on Mars, they
Speaker 1: would likely be several feet below ground because the radiation
Speaker 1: would otherwise scour the surface of the planet clean of life,
Speaker 1: at least any kind of life that we would be
Speaker 1: familiar with. So some of those cosmic particles are traveling
Speaker 1: at such speed that when they hit Mars they actually
Speaker 1: penetrate the soil itself and bury themselves in by a
Speaker 1: few feet. So you'd probably have to dig down at
Speaker 1: least a meter or so if you hope to find
Speaker 1: evidence of organic material like the kind we have here
Speaker 1: on Earth. All right, So any mission to Mars with
Speaker 1: human beings is going to have to take into account radiation,
Speaker 1: atmospheric issues, landing challenges, water supply, food supply, some means
Speaker 1: of cleaning off contaminants to avoid thyroid issues brought on
Speaker 1: by exposure to percolorance. The Hey, we've been to the Moon.
Speaker 1: We can totally do this, right, Well, it's It's certainly
Speaker 1: a goal that several people and organizations have set for themselves,
Speaker 1: though not all of those proposals have been met with enthusiasm.
Speaker 1: Let's take one of the more questionable ones first, because
Speaker 1: I remember being incredibly skeptical of it when I first
Speaker 1: heard about it back in two thousand twelve. I'm talking
Speaker 1: about Mars One now. According to co founder Bas Lansdorp,
Speaker 1: he and his co founder ar No Wielders created this
Speaker 1: organization back in two thousand eleven. Their plan was to
Speaker 1: create a project with the goal of sending humans to Mars,
Speaker 1: and it would be a one way trip. Those humans
Speaker 1: were meant to a stay, publish a permanent colony on Mars,
Speaker 1: and they also wanted this project to make use of
Speaker 1: as much existing technology as possible, which would help cut
Speaker 1: down costs. They wouldn't have to do research and development
Speaker 1: on new tech. They wanted to manage this with as
Speaker 1: much existing tech as they could, and they thought by
Speaker 1: making it a one way trip and by relying on
Speaker 1: existing technology, they could cut the cost down significantly. They
Speaker 1: produced a roadmap back in two thousand twelve with a
Speaker 1: timeline for various key elements they identified as being necessary
Speaker 1: to lead up to the point of sending the first
Speaker 1: crew to Mars. The selection process was to begin in
Speaker 1: two thousand and thirteen. Originally, the company's goal was to
Speaker 1: land a small crew of four people on Mars by
Speaker 1: twenty three. Well it's twenty eighteen now, so we're getting
Speaker 1: pretty darned close to that date. But no worries because
Speaker 1: over time Mars one has pushed that date back more
Speaker 1: than once. The latest version of the roadmap now estimates
Speaker 1: a twenty thirty two touchdown for the first crew mission.
Speaker 1: Between now and then would be other missions to test
Speaker 1: various technologies and to establish communication satellites, as well as
Speaker 1: the infrastructure that will be necessary for the colony moving forward.
Speaker 1: News of the project spread very quickly in two thousand twelve.
Speaker 1: Some people thought this was a really interesting idea, some
Speaker 1: people considered it interesting but really super ambitious, and some
Speaker 1: felt that it was just whackadoodle crazy talk. Now wrapped
Speaker 1: up with this incredibly challenging goal of getting people to
Speaker 1: Mars safely and then keeping them alive was a reality
Speaker 1: television element. The organization sent out the equivalent of a
Speaker 1: casting call for perspective colonists. So to apply, you were
Speaker 1: so happosed to pay a forty dollar application fee and
Speaker 1: submit your application. Mars one claims that around two hundred
Speaker 1: thousand people submitted applications. I have not found any sources
Speaker 1: to back that up, but if it's true, that means
Speaker 1: a cool eight million dollars flooded the organization's coffers. That's
Speaker 1: probably not true. Though NBC counted up the number of
Speaker 1: video applications that were on the Mars one website that
Speaker 1: was part of the application process was submitting a video
Speaker 1: that would be hosted by Mars one. That number was
Speaker 1: two thousand seven two, which is a far cry away
Speaker 1: from two hundred thousand and then the reality television element
Speaker 1: was supposed to kick in during the training process and
Speaker 1: the selection process. There was to be a reality television
Speaker 1: show program that would document all of this, and the
Speaker 1: proceeds the money raised by advertising on that program would
Speaker 1: go towards supporting the project. That program never really materialized.
Speaker 1: There were some sort of questionable circumstances around that. I'm
Speaker 1: not going to go into it, but it just sounds
Speaker 1: like things just didn't work out properly. And anyway, even
Speaker 1: if you assume that two hundred thousand people did apply
Speaker 1: as the company suggests, that would still only mean eight
Speaker 1: million dollars and no eight million dollars and a lot
Speaker 1: of money, but it's peanuts when it comes to space travel.
Speaker 1: NASA has estimated that it would cost one hundred billion
Speaker 1: dollars to send people to Mars, although to be fair,
Speaker 1: NASA's estimate also includes bringing them back to Earth, and
Speaker 1: those estimates have ranged from one hundred billion dollars to
Speaker 1: four hundred fifty billion dollars. And keep in mind that
Speaker 1: does include bringing people back to Earth, so that obviously
Speaker 1: adds a lot to the expense, right, And that was
Speaker 1: one of the points that the Mars One folks said,
Speaker 1: is that we aren't planning on breaking them back. That's
Speaker 1: where they're gonna live, so we can cut that out
Speaker 1: of the the project entirely, but the Mars One estimate
Speaker 1: is that sending the first four colonists will cost six
Speaker 1: billion dollars. That's still an astronomical number pun intended, but
Speaker 1: it's just a drop in the bucket of what other
Speaker 1: people have estimated it cost to get a colony started
Speaker 1: on Mars. Mars One's plan is to send up living
Speaker 1: units as in habitats. These sort of like the space
Speaker 1: living rooms. The artists renderings make them look a lot
Speaker 1: like the space capsules from the Apollo missions. They kind
Speaker 1: of have that sort of general shape to them. The
Speaker 1: initial habitat would include two living units, to life support
Speaker 1: units and a supply unit, plus a couple of rovers.
Speaker 1: The first rover would actually arrive before anything else, and
Speaker 1: it would be in charge of scouting out a good
Speaker 1: location for the actual colony and then hauling the various
Speaker 1: units like the habitat and life support units to the
Speaker 1: appropriate locations at that destination. The project is pretty vague
Speaker 1: about a lot of details about stuff that would need
Speaker 1: to happen for this to all work, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: make claims that the facilities on Mars would be generating
Speaker 1: oxygen and water by processing the Martians soil and using
Speaker 1: plant systems inside habitats. The colony, according to the company,
Speaker 1: would also make use of inflatable habitats that would provide
Speaker 1: one thousand cubic meters of space. Now, if those were
Speaker 1: on the surface of Mars, you would still have the
Speaker 1: problem of radiation to deal with. But one proposed solution
Speaker 1: is to send robots up ahead that would dig out
Speaker 1: a space and inflate the habitats inside the holes, and
Speaker 1: that way you would have an underground habitat, and the
Speaker 1: soil of Mars itself could provide protection against radiation, assuming
Speaker 1: you dug down deep enough. But that does present lots
Speaker 1: and lots of other challenges. Also, Mars One isn't in
Speaker 1: the business of making this technology. They plan on contracting
Speaker 1: with other companies to provide spacecraft, launch vehicles rovers that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. As far as I know, there are
Speaker 1: no existing contracts to do any of that right now.
Speaker 1: There were some feasibility studies that were done early on,
Speaker 1: but as far as I can tell, that's all that's happened.
Speaker 1: There's also been no real information about who is developing
Speaker 1: those habitats or what the spacecraft is going to be like,
Speaker 1: or how it will even land on Mars. So, in short,
Speaker 1: there's a whole lot of stuff that's like really super
Speaker 1: necessary to make sure people don't, you know, die, and
Speaker 1: a lot of it hasn't been talked about at all.
Speaker 1: For those and many other reasons, there are plenty of
Speaker 1: people in the space business who think that Mars one
Speaker 1: is at best completely out of its element, that it
Speaker 1: has been enough way more than it can chew. There
Speaker 1: are others who worry that it's a total scam and
Speaker 1: not even a legitimate project. More than a few of
Speaker 1: the people who had made it through the initial round
Speaker 1: of the crew selection process have since left the project,
Speaker 1: many of them disillusioned about the lack of information and preparation.
Speaker 1: And it may very well be that the founders of
Speaker 1: Mars one are completely sincere in their desire to send
Speaker 1: people to Mars, but it doesn't sound like the work
Speaker 1: that was needed to make that happen and to keep
Speaker 1: people alive has been done, and I seriously doubt it
Speaker 1: will get done. There's also lots of reports about various
Speaker 1: financial problems that the company has encountered over recent times,
Speaker 1: so I would be truly shocked if even within the
Speaker 1: next twenty years, this company is able to capitalize on
Speaker 1: on even of the plans they've made. My guess is
Speaker 1: that it will limp around for a bit longer and
Speaker 1: then eventually just sort of fade away and no one
Speaker 1: will have heard of it afterward. Uh. But that's a guess.
Speaker 1: They could prove me totally wrong, and I kind of
Speaker 1: hope they do, because it would be incredible, but the
Speaker 1: odds are stacked against them. I have other Mars Colony
Speaker 1: projects to talk about, but before I get into that,
Speaker 1: let's take another quick break to thank our sponsor. Next,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about Mars Direct. This is a
Speaker 1: plan that was developed by Dr Robert Zubrin, and Zubran's
Speaker 1: plan would allow humans to not just travel to Mars,
Speaker 1: but to come back from Mars, so this is not
Speaker 1: a one way trip situation. To do so, we would
Speaker 1: have to develop methods to manufacture rocket fuel from materials
Speaker 1: on Mars, particularly materials that are found in Mars' atmosphere,
Speaker 1: and he advocates using Martians soil and minerals in it
Speaker 1: for a construction materials, which could be problematic with the
Speaker 1: percolorate issue. And like the Mars One plan, he feels
Speaker 1: that would be important to extract water from the Martians
Speaker 1: soil to support life. But unlike the Mars One Plan,
Speaker 1: he goes into a lot more detail about his ideas
Speaker 1: and has a lot more scholarship to back him up
Speaker 1: on many of his plans. So in the Mars Direct Plan,
Speaker 1: the initial plan, the first step was to send an
Speaker 1: unmanned spacecraft called the Earth Return Vehicle to Mars. So
Speaker 1: essentially you're putting the the return ship onto Mars's surface.
Speaker 1: That's your first step. And not only would it be
Speaker 1: the spacecraft, it would also the payload would also include
Speaker 1: a rover that would be able to travel on the
Speaker 1: surface of Mars and do mission parameters or fulfillment and parameters,
Speaker 1: i should say. And then the nuclear reactors that the
Speaker 1: Mars Colony would use to process materials to generate rocket fuel.
Speaker 1: And the idea would be that between the rover, these
Speaker 1: nuclear reactors, and the return vehicle, you would be able
Speaker 1: to process enough material to fully fuel the return vehicle
Speaker 1: and have it ready to go, so that day one,
Speaker 1: when you land on Mars, you've already got your return
Speaker 1: ticket ready. So that was the first part of the plan.
Speaker 1: Then you would have a second trip where you would
Speaker 1: send two payloads. Uh. One would be a second Earth
Speaker 1: Return vehicle or e r V, and another would be
Speaker 1: a habitat module that would be a place where people
Speaker 1: would actually live and a few astronauts along the way
Speaker 1: as well. The initial plan was to send four and
Speaker 1: that way you would never have a situation where anyone
Speaker 1: would be alone. People can travel in pairs. The astronauts
Speaker 1: would spend about a year and a half on Mars
Speaker 1: before jumping into one of the r v's and returning
Speaker 1: home or maybe you know, both if necessary, But that
Speaker 1: would give them plenty of time to work on Mars,
Speaker 1: to start setting up the colony and to uh get things,
Speaker 1: you know, really prepared for future trips. And while they
Speaker 1: would be returning home, a new crew and new e
Speaker 1: r v s and new habitat units could be traveling
Speaker 1: back toward Mars, because it's taking advantage of that same
Speaker 1: launch window way he talked about earlier, and so you
Speaker 1: would be adding more and more habitat units and Earth
Speaker 1: Return vehicles to the surface of Mars. This would keep
Speaker 1: up a cycle that would allow astronauts to explore more
Speaker 1: and more of the planet and eventually start linking those
Speaker 1: hab units together to create a larger colony that could
Speaker 1: be sustainable. And his plan really depends upon us making
Speaker 1: the most out of the materials that are available on
Speaker 1: Mars as aaron. As Mars is, there are a lot
Speaker 1: of ways that we could potentially exploit the material there
Speaker 1: to create a colony, and including things like extracting that
Speaker 1: water from the soil. So it's a lot of living
Speaker 1: off the land kind of mentality as much as we
Speaker 1: possibly could now. Unlike Mars One, the Mars Direct plan
Speaker 1: is just a proposal. It's not a project that's being
Speaker 1: run by a nonprofit that has a for profit element
Speaker 1: that's supposed to handle all the money. That's what Mars
Speaker 1: one is doing. Mars Direct isn't. It's more of an idea,
Speaker 1: a strategy that's advocated by Zubrin and the Mars Society.
Speaker 1: It is not an active organization that's taking investments in
Speaker 1: the supposed effort to send people to Mars. Zubrian has
Speaker 1: proposed it to NASA, and after some initial criticisms about
Speaker 1: the plan, he went back and made some changes to
Speaker 1: his approach. One of those changes became uh the Mars
Speaker 1: Semidirect approach, which would put the Earth returned vehicle not
Speaker 1: on the surface of Mars, but rather insert it into
Speaker 1: the orbit around Mars. So the Earth return vehicle, the
Speaker 1: return ticket home would be in orbit around Mars. And
Speaker 1: on Mars you would put a different vehicle called the
Speaker 1: Mars Ascent Vehicle, and it's only job would be to
Speaker 1: launch a crew off the surface of Mars into Martian orbit,
Speaker 1: where then it could rendezvous with the e r V
Speaker 1: that was already out in orbit. Astronauts would transfer over
Speaker 1: to the e r V and then they could head home.
Speaker 1: So this way the e r V itself would uh
Speaker 1: would not have to do all the work of liftoff
Speaker 1: and then travel all the way to Earth. It would
Speaker 1: already be in orbit. It would mean that you would
Speaker 1: have to already fuel the e r V, most likely
Speaker 1: because it would never be on the surface of Mars,
Speaker 1: so you couldn't build out that fuel depot approach for
Speaker 1: the r V. You could do it for the Mars
Speaker 1: A sent vehicle. However, now it's possible we might see
Speaker 1: a mission similar to what Mars direct or Mars Semidirect proposes,
Speaker 1: and there are other suggestions out there as well. So
Speaker 1: NASA looked at this and said, there are some elements
Speaker 1: to here that we think are really interesting, and they
Speaker 1: kind of incorporated that into their own proposed long term
Speaker 1: plan for Mars. But there are others who have argued
Speaker 1: for more ambitious plans that would happen sooner than that.
Speaker 1: One guy was Dennis Tito, who founded a nonprofit organization
Speaker 1: in ten called Inspiration Mars Foundation, and the plan was
Speaker 1: to fly a crude mission, as in a mission with
Speaker 1: people on it, not not crude as in, hey get
Speaker 1: a load of that mission anyway. This plan was to
Speaker 1: send this spacecraft around Mars and then back to Earth,
Speaker 1: so fly by essentially. Initially, the hope was to do
Speaker 1: that by this year and by this year I mean
Speaker 1: eighteen when I'm recording this episode. However, that did not
Speaker 1: work out, and the next opportunity to do so at
Speaker 1: the lowest energy expenditure would be in one Tito's organization
Speaker 1: estimated that the cost of this mission would be somewhere
Speaker 1: between one and two billion dollars, and Tito said that
Speaker 1: he had secured about three hundred million dollars in potential investments,
Speaker 1: but that he would need an additional seven hundred million,
Speaker 1: and he was hoping that the US government would give
Speaker 1: it to him, but Congress said, no, Dice, We're happy
Speaker 1: to give you expertise, but no Mullah, And as far
Speaker 1: as I can tell, the project pretty much died out
Speaker 1: after that. Then there's Elon Musk and SpaceX. Elon Musk
Speaker 1: has been incredibly bullish on Mars, to say the least.
Speaker 1: In an interview on HBO that happened very recently, Musk
Speaker 1: said he gave himself a seventy percent chance of moving
Speaker 1: to Mars, and in that same interview he said, quote,
Speaker 1: we think you can come back, but we're not sure
Speaker 1: end quote. So in other words, it would be perhaps
Speaker 1: a life sentence to Mars that you're going to move
Speaker 1: there knowing that you will die there, and also that
Speaker 1: conditions are so harsh that you might die there much
Speaker 1: earlier than you would have otherwise. He's very forward about
Speaker 1: the whole thing and says, yeah, Mars is dangerous, and
Speaker 1: your risk of death on route to Mars, as well
Speaker 1: as just day to day living on Mars is much
Speaker 1: higher than it would be on Earth. But he still
Speaker 1: thinks he's he's got se chance of ending up there.
Speaker 1: So Musk projects that such a trip might be possible
Speaker 1: in less than a decade and might cost around a
Speaker 1: couple hundred thousand dollars once it's turned into a space
Speaker 1: tourism kind of thing. SpaceX in general has some big
Speaker 1: Mars plans as well as general plans for a craziness
Speaker 1: in space. In September two eighteen, SpaceX announced a deal
Speaker 1: with Yusaku Mazawa, who had secured a pretty darn exclusive ticket.
Speaker 1: Mazawa is going to become the first private passenger to
Speaker 1: fly around the Moon right now. The projection for that
Speaker 1: trip is to happen sometime in twenty three. No telling
Speaker 1: how much that ticket cost, but I bet it was
Speaker 1: way more than a couple of hundred thousand dollars. The
Speaker 1: hope is that private space flight will initiate a whole
Speaker 1: trend and that will help fund the development of the
Speaker 1: b f R that's the successor to space X's Falcon
Speaker 1: Heavy and Dragon systems. So the Falcon Heavy is a
Speaker 1: launch vehicle and the Dragon is a spacecraft capsule. The
Speaker 1: BFR would be a two stage spacecraft. It would consist
Speaker 1: of a booster and then the spacecraft itself, and it's
Speaker 1: on a b f R that Musk says he would
Speaker 1: travel to Mars, assuming that they're able to complete the
Speaker 1: design and testing phase and build out the stuff. Now,
Speaker 1: according to the SpaceX site, the BFR is designed to
Speaker 1: quote ultimately carry as many as one people on long
Speaker 1: duration interplanetary flights end quote. So this is a beast
Speaker 1: of a spacecraft, much much, much larger than anything we've
Speaker 1: ever seen up to this point. SpaceX wants to send
Speaker 1: unmanned missions to Mars in twenty twenty two to deliver
Speaker 1: components that would be critical. They would they would begin
Speaker 1: various processes like mining, life support, and power production on
Speaker 1: Mars way ahead of any humans getting there. Then in
Speaker 1: four they would follow that up with a mission with
Speaker 1: actual human beings on it, and that would have the
Speaker 1: goal of building out a propellant deep oh and the
Speaker 1: basic colony site, which would grow with subsequent missions. Now,
Speaker 1: while all of this sounds pretty incredible, not everyone is
Speaker 1: sold on the idea. Bill Knight, the Science Guy, a
Speaker 1: science communicator extraordinaire, has expressed hearty skepticism about colonizing Mars. Now,
Speaker 1: I have not touched on the concept of terraforming in
Speaker 1: this episode. Terraforming is when we try to transform a
Speaker 1: planet's environment to make it habitable. Uh so it would
Speaker 1: require an enormous amount of energy. We've never done it.
Speaker 1: We've never terraformed a planet before. We have certainly affected
Speaker 1: our own planet, but we haven't terraformed another planet. So
Speaker 1: we don't even really know how much energy and money
Speaker 1: and resources it would take, but we're guessing it would
Speaker 1: be a lot. Bill Knight kind of dismisses this idea
Speaker 1: pretty quickly points out, we're not even able to take
Speaker 1: care of the planet we live on now, so if
Speaker 1: we can't take care of Earth, what's to suggest we
Speaker 1: would make some other inhospitable planet habitable. In addition, nine
Speaker 1: points out how life on Mars wouldn't just be difficult
Speaker 1: and dangerous and potentially deadly. It would be relentlessly difficult,
Speaker 1: but it would also be monotonous. You would always be indoors,
Speaker 1: whether you're inside the habitat or inside a space suit.
Speaker 1: You would never be outside outside because you would die
Speaker 1: if you were to ever leave a space suit. You
Speaker 1: would have to be in a space suit if you
Speaker 1: were out on the surface of Mars. So your day
Speaker 1: to day life would be very monotonous. It would also
Speaker 1: get kind of smelly, you know, you don't have a
Speaker 1: whole of opportunity to use various systems to clean. You'd
Speaker 1: be using a lot of a breeze. He says he
Speaker 1: actually specifically called that out, which I thought was kind
Speaker 1: of funny. You would always be in cramped quarters with
Speaker 1: the same people. You would always be worried about the
Speaker 1: next potential disaster because stuff does wear out or its
Speaker 1: stuff becomes less efficient over time and you have to
Speaker 1: replace it. Sometimes that might mean that you need to
Speaker 1: do it, you know, in an emergency situation, because it
Speaker 1: could be two years before you get more stuff from Earth,
Speaker 1: depending upon where Earth and Mars are in their respective
Speaker 1: orbits and how long ago it was that you got
Speaker 1: your last shipment. So it be super duper hard to do.
Speaker 1: And and Bill and I thinks it's just not a
Speaker 1: practical long term endeavor. He does think that humans exploring
Speaker 1: Mars on a temporary basis could be really cool, but
Speaker 1: setting up a colony doesn't make much sense personally. I'm
Speaker 1: of two minds honestly about Mars colonies. On the one hand,
Speaker 1: I do think it would be incredibly hard to do
Speaker 1: and to make safe and to ensure the survivability of
Speaker 1: the colony and the people you send there. I think
Speaker 1: it might be too big of a risk to really
Speaker 1: merit going after it. However, that being said, if you
Speaker 1: take the challenge of creating a effective colony on Mars
Speaker 1: as your goal, then that drives a lot of innovation
Speaker 1: because you have to come up with ways to solve
Speaker 1: these problems I've been talking about. And so I almost
Speaker 1: want to say that taking on the goal of building
Speaker 1: out a colony on Mars is a good idea simply
Speaker 1: to drive that innovation and the research and development that
Speaker 1: would be necessary to make it happen. But then to say,
Speaker 1: just kidding, We're not going to do it, but we
Speaker 1: are gonna totally take advantage of all this innovation that
Speaker 1: has come up as a result. You look at the
Speaker 1: space race between the United States and the Soviet Union
Speaker 1: that led to the development of lots of technologies that
Speaker 1: have had applications well beyond space exploration, and we have
Speaker 1: benefited from that those those uh in the chins. So
Speaker 1: can you even imagine the sort of stuff that might
Speaker 1: come out as part of a very focused effort to
Speaker 1: make possible a Mars colony. Even if we never establish
Speaker 1: a colony on Mars. It could be incredibly beneficial in
Speaker 1: many different ways, ways we can't even anticipate right now,
Speaker 1: So I think ultimately I'm in favor of pursuing the goal,
Speaker 1: but also maintaining a healthy dose of skepticism and critical
Speaker 1: thinking about whether or not it ultimately makes sense to
Speaker 1: actually pull the trigger and go there. Um. It's fascinating
Speaker 1: stuff though. I'm sure that Mars is going to play
Speaker 1: an important role in space exploration for the future of humanity,
Speaker 1: but whether or not it will be in colony form,
Speaker 1: I don't know. What do you guys think. I'm curious
Speaker 1: to hear your thoughts about colonizing Mars. Do you think
Speaker 1: it's worthwhile? Do you think it would be a waste
Speaker 1: of time and resources? Do you think there's some other
Speaker 1: place out in our Solar system or beyond that we
Speaker 1: should really be focusing on. Keeping in mind that if
Speaker 1: we want to go outside of our solar system, that's
Speaker 1: an even longer trip, which means even more problems with radiation.
Speaker 1: But still it's good to think about. Send me a
Speaker 1: message telling me your thoughts. The email address for the
Speaker 1: show is tech Stuff at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: You can go on over to tech Stuff Podcast dot com.
Speaker 1: That's the website for the show. You can find other
Speaker 1: ways to contact me. You also see a link over
Speaker 1: to t public dot com slash tech stuff. That's our
Speaker 1: merchandise store. Remember every purchase you make goes to help
Speaker 1: the show, and we greatly appreciate it. And that's all
Speaker 1: for me. I'll talk to you again really soon for
Speaker 1: more on this and bothands of other topics. Is it
Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com One