200,000 people apply to be first to live on Mars

[Wilikon]

I signed up.

Really?  What made you do it? And did you get selected to the next stage, the 1058 candidates they chose?

I figured I was a good candidate for it.

I currently work in Afghanistan living in something the size of half of a truck trailer so I have some experience with living in harsh/confined spaces. My wife passed away last year and we never had any children so I will only be leaving behind family that I hardly ever see anyway.

I have some experience with comms so I could be of some use with the satellite communications and the computer systems.

I also have little confidence in the way the US is headed so I don't plan on returning anyway.

And I would love to be involved in something as historical as being one of the first people on a planet.

I was not chosen however. Perhaps because I would be around 50 by the time the flight was ready and they likely want young people who would be more physically fit.

That is too bad if they only get people from the same age group.
Sorry for your loss.

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[inquisitive]

I personally would not want to go there, because I will be missing out on a lot of the amenities that I enjoy here on Earth. I mean, what are we supposed to eat on Mars? How about recreation? No tv, internet, video games, movies, or radio? That's worse than being on Survivor! I think that the 200,000 people that applied for it think that they wouldn't miss Earth anyway, so they are completely ok with being stuck in Mars forever. I find it weird, but hey, it's their life, so let them be.

[Spendulus]

this is mentioned quite often.. it sure would be fun as hell to go to mars, but it doesn't seem realistic for this to happen within our lifetime.

When there's a hundred thousand robots there, building things and extracting minerals and materials that we need, and they have been working for ten years, then we could go.

Mars does have the basic elements in quantities sufficient to support life, but it would need those robots running farms and ranches (sort of) before we could go.  None of these things are easy at all.

And there's a problem with the red dirt, which is apparently a strong oxidizer....your skin/lungs/stomach does not get along with it....

Primary reference for Mars:  google Robert Zubrin.

Another note:  If the landers were rocket based and not aerodynamic, they would have adequate power to weight to take off to low Mars orbit.   Then an entirely separate system is needed for transit between Mars and Earth.

I need to clarify my prior comment.

A) Because a landing craft of the size to hold four humans is heavy, it cannot land except by rocket power.  Some of the braking can be done by air friction, yes.  But if that lander is correctly designed, it would be able to both land people, and take them back to low Mars orbit.  Say good old reliable RL10 rocket motors, (H2/O2).

B) Transport from low Earth orbit to low Mars orbit would be via VASMIR style propulsion systems, which would essentially be a interplanetary ferry, good for nothing but going between planets.

C) assuming the two styles of vehicles could be refueled by work done on the red planet.

D) There is no reason whatsoever the trips would have to be one way.

[bythesea]

I would go, but now when I have a chance to become a millionaire i'm not sure that I wanna go

[Spendulus]

I would go, but now when I have a chance to become a millionaire i'm not sure that I wanna go

Remember, no beer on Mars.

[Wilikon]

I would go, but now when I have a chance to become a millionaire i'm not sure that I wanna go

Remember, no beer on Mars.

... Unless Budweiser is sponsoring one of the space pods?

[Kaligulax]

Imagine you have a crush on someone and they are just going on this mission for decades . You know that they live and have a new life there but youll never have the chance to see them in person again.

[Prometheuz]

One way ticket. Good luck!

[Wilikon]

Imagine you have a crush on someone and they are just going on this mission for decades . You know that they live and have a new life there but youll never have the chance to see them in person again.

You could always buy a ticket to Mars.

[raspcoin]

I personally would not want to go there, because I will be missing out on a lot of the amenities that I enjoy here on Earth. I mean, what are we supposed to eat on Mars? How about recreation? No tv, internet, video games, movies, or radio? That's worse than being on Survivor! I think that the 200,000 people that applied for it think that they wouldn't miss Earth anyway, so they are completely ok with being stuck in Mars forever. I find it weird, but hey, it's their life, so let them be.

The biggest (long-term) problem with modern entertainment on Mars is the travel time between Mars and Earth. However, it is only a matter of resources and energy to solve the remaining recreational issues, which should not be a problem for someone who has the money and technology to travel to Mars. Regarding food, it is already possible to print pizzas and hamburgers, so that should not be a major issue on Mars. Radiation and lack of oxygen are probably the biggest problems, but that has nothing to do with recreation, only survival.

[Wilikon]

New propulsion technologies may blast astronauts through space at breakneck speeds in the coming decades, making manned Mars missions much faster and safer.

Souped-up electric propulsion systems and rockets driven by nuclear fusion or fission could end up shortening travel times to the Red Planet dramatically, proponents say, potentially opening up a new era in manned space exploration.

"Using existing rocket fuels, it's nearly impossible for humans to explore much beyond Earth," John Slough of the University of Washington, leader of a team developing a fusion-driven rocket, said in a statement earlier this year. "We are hoping to give us a much more powerful source of energy in space that could eventually lead to making interplanetary travel commonplace."

[...]
One possible solution is the nuclear fusion rocket being developed by Slough and his team, with funding from the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts program, or NIAC.

Such a system could get astronauts to the Red Planet in just 90 days or so, the researchers say. In fact, they're designing their work around a reference mission that lasts a total of 210 days — 83 days for the flight out, 30 days on the Red Planet's surface and a 97-day journey back to Earth.

Harnessing the power of nuclear fusion— the same process that fuels the sun and gives hydrogen bombs their enormous destructive potential — would make such speedy trips possible, team members say.

In their engine, bubbles of plasma — made from deuterium and tritium, "heavy" isotopes of hydrogen — would be injected into a chamber, where a magnetic field would collapse metal rings around them. This would briefly compress the bubbles into a fusion state, releasing energy that would vaporize and ionize the metal. The metal would then be accelerated out the back of the spacecraft through a nozzle, creating thrust.

A lot of work will be required to bring this concept to reality, but there's no reason to think that it won't work, the researchers say.

http://www.space.com/23445-mars-missions-superfast-propulsion-incredible-technology.html

[bythesea]

I would go, but now when I have a chance to become a millionaire i'm not sure that I wanna go

Remember, no beer on Mars.

Oh no not gonna happen then ill stay home

[Spendulus]

I personally would not want to go there, because I will be missing out on a lot of the amenities that I enjoy here on Earth. I mean, what are we supposed to eat on Mars? How about recreation? No tv, internet, video games, movies, or radio? That's worse than being on Survivor! I think that the 200,000 people that applied for it think that they wouldn't miss Earth anyway, so they are completely ok with being stuck in Mars forever. I find it weird, but hey, it's their life, so let them be.

The biggest (long-term) problem with modern entertainment on Mars is the travel time between Mars and Earth. However, it is only a matter of resources and energy to solve the remaining recreational issues, which should not be a problem for someone who has the money and technology to travel to Mars. Regarding food, it is already possible to print pizzas and hamburgers, so that should not be a major issue on Mars. Radiation and lack of oxygen are probably the biggest problems, but that has nothing to do with recreation, only survival.

Umm, no.  Food and materials is a major issue.

The reason is that we need to look at Mars as having the basic elements from the periodic table that are necessary for life.  Then we have to figure out how to remove them from the compounds they are in, and put them into the compounds that we need.

This isn't nearly as simple as it might seem.  It might take 50-100 years.  But after that is accomplished, then Mars is whatever we make it to be - within limits.  It will still have a crappy worthlessly thin atmosphere, and it'll still be bitterly cold, with a weak Sun.

[dadomado]

 I think we still do not have such technology and the level of
How could safely be sure to keep these and similar missions could become a reality in the near future, although the idea is great and deserves to be praised ....

[Spendulus]

I think we still do not have such technology and the level of
How could safely be sure to keep these and similar missions could become a reality in the near future, although the idea is great and deserves to be praised ....

Yeah.  Well, a first step would be to attempt to grow something, somewhere on Mars.  A crop.  That would mean making some kind of dirt up that the crop would like, and creating a pressurized environment that could sustain it.
Temperatures inside that dome would have to be within the range that could sustain life, say 50-100F.

A.  Envision a dome surrounded by solar reflectors that concentrated the sun at the center.  

B. Use a highly engineered crop.  

C.  Fix the issues of temperature, pressure, partial pressure of needed gases, and need for nitrogen, carbon, and trace elements from raw Mars, brought in to support the life system.

D.  Figure out how to make (A) from native materials by robots and you are on your way to solving this riddle.

E.  Replicate and prove the process with 100 different crops.

F.  Grow some meat.  Same basic issues, does not matter if it is in test tubes or live animals.

In other words, think in terms of robot farmers and ranchers, somehow.  Then consider that when and if that existed, man could EASILY go to Mars.  But until it did exist, he gonna die there.

Oh and while we are on the subject, Mars is not capable of being "terraformed", because of the lack of a magnetosphere.

Boatloads of bad science and mystical thinking here.

[nasamanBoy]

Truth is that only 2,000 humans are going to live and work there. The food, the entertainment, the electricity, the gravity, and sending messages to the earth , It  all costs.....Bilions and  billions....

[nitehawk]

call this a hunch .. but if the 1st set of people actually land on the planet.. somethings gonna happen and there gonna kill each other.. .


someones gonna poop at the wrong time .. eat the wrong food .. forget to wash there butt .. something very very very stupid ..


ask anyone whos ever been to basic training.. people in close quarters for long lengths of time are %($ holes..  the difference here is they are on another planet with little to no hope of coming back .. and no one to punish them for what they do.

[Wilikon]

Keeping fit. Exercises led by a humanoid robot



Conducting leg surgery via teleconference



Mapping the terrain


[...]
Human ingenuity has been perfecting the technology we will need on Mars, but what we can’t do is eliminate human follies. Beyond all the technical experiments performed, these simulated expeditions help prepare us to best deal with those.

http://www.scienceworldreport.com/articles/12724/20140206/scientists-at-work-living-on-a-simulated-mars.htm

[thetruth]

They are going nowhere.
Listen to the whisper!
http://www.awe130.com/index.php/the-latest-news

[hilariousandco]

There was a hoax reality show on in the UK a while ago called Space Cadets where they successfully tricked people into thinking they were going and actually went into space. Was pretty funny. You can watch it on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34wjPxl1DAE
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Cadets_%28TV_series%29