NASA’s Mars Pattern Return (MSR) mission has run aground, wrecked by a $10 billion value estimate, a 16 yr timeline and extreme mission and programmatic danger. If the mission is to proceed, a a lot easier and cheaper method have to be discovered.
Happily, such an method is accessible. The present MSR mission plan is so expensive, advanced, and dangerous as a result of it has not been approached as a mission to be achieved as swiftly and cheaply as attainable, however as an exercise for use to unify the worldwide area exploration neighborhood by giving as many gamers as attainable one thing to do. Thus the present script for MSR gives starring roles for, amongst others, the Perseverance mission workforce, the JPL Mars helicopter growth workforce, the Mars Ascent Car (MAV) growth workforce, the numerous nations of the European Area Company, the superior propulsion neighborhood, autonomous rendezvous and dock expertise builders, precision touchdown technologists, Mars lander builders, Mars orbiter builders, the Planetary Safety forms and even perhaps the Artemis program Deep Area Gateway program.
The way in which to cheapen, quicken and de-risk the mission is to chop most of this mob out of the motion.
There are two methods this may be carried out. The best is simply to see what we may do utilizing one launch of the confirmed Curiosity/Perseverance skycrane touchdown system to ship a pattern return mission to the Pink Planet.
The present skycrane can ship 1000 kilograms to the Martian floor. Because the numbers within the first column of the beneath desk present, that is fairly enough to ship a two-stage MAV to Mars which, if powered by off the shelf storable NTO/MMH hypergolic propellants, could be able to sending a 40 kilogram spacecraft first to low Mars orbit after which immediately again to Earth with none want for orbital rendezvous with one other automobile.
Moreover, a 180 kilogram Spirit-sized rover able to gathering samples is also introduced alongside as effectively, negating the necessity to perform a precision floor rendezvous with and acquire samples from Perseverance, which can or might not be operational when the time comes. The 40 kilogram spacecraft may embody 5 kilograms of samples, a ten kilogram passive capsule product of light-weight supplies — giving it a sufficiently low terminal velocity to make a parachute system pointless — and a 25 kilogram propulsion, navigation and steering system to ship it alongside its manner.
It could be famous that 477 kilograms of the payload delivered to Mars is the propellant wanted to come back house. This implies that nice mass financial savings — or elevated return payload capability — could possibly be achieved by making use of expertise to supply high-performance methane/oxygen propellant out of native supplies on Mars. This different is proven within the second column of the desk. Methane/oxygen propellant will be constructed from carbon dioxide and water, each of which can be found on Mars. Nonetheless, to eradicate the necessity to mine Martian ice or permafrost, I like to recommend bringing hydrogen and simply making use of Martian CO2 (which gives 95% of the propellant mass) which will be acquired wherever on Mars just by operating a roughing pump.
Choices for the Mars Pattern Return
| Choice 1: Use NTO/MMH from Earth | Choice 2: Use CH4/O2 from Mars | |
| MAV Isp | 330 s | 370 s |
| Delta V first stage | 4500 m/s | 4500 m/s |
| Delta V second stage | 2500 m/s | 2500 m/s |
| Pattern dimension | 5 kg | 25 kg |
| Capsule mass | 10 kg | 50 kg |
| Return S/C mass | 20 kg | 70 kg |
| Propellant from Earth | 477 kg | 0 kg |
| H2 feedstock to make propellant | 0 kg | 78 kg (makes 1,307 kg CH4/O2) |
| Rover | 180 kg | 180 kg |
| Solar energy system | 20 kg | 100 kg |
| Propellant manufacturing system | 0 kg | 100 kg |
| MAV tanks, engines, construction | 48 kg | 157 kg |
| Mission mass with out margin | 765 kg | 760 kg |
| Margin | 235 kg | 240 kg |
| Whole landed mass | 1,000 kg | 1,000 kg |
Whereas utilizing regionally produced methane/oxygen does add complexity to the mission, it quintuples the quantity of pattern that may be returned. It will additionally exhibit a key expertise for enabling human Mars missions to observe. However both manner, the mission can readily get carried out by direct return, with out the acute programmatic danger related to requiring a European orbiter powered by superior propulsion to be developed on time, in addition to the technical danger related to placing autonomous rendezvous and dock in Mars orbit within the mission vital path.
All of that is simple, offered that NASA dispenses with the extraordinarily expensive and nonsensical requirement for breaking the chain of contact with the floor imposed on the MSR mission by irrational planetary safety bureaucrats. Billions of tons of Mars rocks ejected by meteor influence have already travelled to Earth, with 500 kilograms of unsterilized materials persevering with to land on our planet yearly.
Beneath these circumstances, taking heroic measures to quarantine a number of kilograms of Mars samples being introduced again by MSR makes about as a lot sense as ordering the border patrol to go looking each vacationer automotive coming in from the north to ensure nobody is importing Canada Geese. Humoring the planetary protectionists requires including an orbiter, a launch automobile and autonomous rendezvous and dock expertise to the MSR mission, exploding its prices to the purpose the place it has starved the remainder of the Mars exploration program nearly out of existence. These prices have made it unimaginable to ship different spacecraft to Mars, similar to life detection missions, for instance. Now it threatens to kill itself as effectively.
NASA must determine whether or not it desires to have an efficient Mars exploration program or a fortunately empowered planetary safety forms. It could’t have each.
Robert Zubrin is an aerospace engineer and president of the Mars Society. His most up-to-date ebook, The New World on Mars: What Can We Create on the Pink Planet, was not too long ago revealed by Diversion Books.
