Challenges Mars Pioneers Will Face, and How They Will Solve Them—Red Planet Live recap--

Landing on Mars is the obvious challenge, but settling the Red Planet has a plethora of other obstacles to overcome. Dr. Sarah Milkovich, Science Systems Engineer at NASA/JPL, laid out the challenges Mars pioneers will face during a recent guest appearance on Red Planet Live. 


Breaking down challenges
Milkovich divided the many Mars settlements into categories: 

Physical challenges
Today, physical challenges are the most obvious issue facing the Mars human settlement effort. Phys.org explains that three things come together to make Mars physically difficult to land on. 

The planet’s gravity
NASA estimates that Mars has about one-third of Earth’s gravity. For that reason, objects such as spacecraft would land more slowly than they would on earth. 

Mars’ atmosphere 
Over eons, Mars’ atmosphere broke down. NASA attributes the atmospheric breakdown to the “desiccated” surface of Mars today. 

Once upon a time, Mars may have had a life-supporting environment but is now a barren, dusty wasteland. 

Mars’ atmosphere is “perilously thin,” Phys.org wrote. Because it is thinner than the earth, it brings some unique navigational challenges. 

Earth’s atmosphere is thicker than Mars’. For that reason, an aircraft can glide gently from point to point. 

Mars has a thin atmosphere that takes away this glide factor. Instead, the space raft plummets toward that landing point, reaching speeds of 12,000 mph. 


To date, successful human-piloted space missions have been on the Moon. The Moon, unlike Earth or Mars, has no atmosphere. For that reason, landing teams can use retrorockets, a kind of rocket that uses thrusters.


The red planet’s distance from Earth 
Many modern aeronautics companies are paving paths to work around the problem of distance. Distance problems circle primarily around the need for fuel sources. Other issues include materials that can withstand the trip.  


Rocket fuel 
Space innovators, such as Orbit Fab, look for ways to launch “gas stations” from satellites. These “gas stations” would act as halfway points to refuel space craft on the long journey to the Red planet.

Expenses and other material challenges
If you’ve been following Better Futures for a while, you’ve been hearing us speak on the money challenges of Space. Space, just like earthbound business, requires governing policies and business cases to put assets in the sky. 

Mars presents big-ticket science and innovation needs that aeronautics companies will have to solve around. They will need to work within the scope of the policy, all while using science to the best of current human understanding.

The mental toll
 Milkovich explained that the toll of Mars would be far more than the physical strain it takes to get there. 

Because the atmosphere is so thin, Mars settlers would have to live in artificial environments. Air would need to be piped in, sometimes into enclosed tube-like cities.

These would sometimes be subterranean, meaning that the Mars pioneer would also never see the sun. 


Ways scientists will overcome obstacles
Milkovich has confidence in robotics for Mars exploration. Robots can go to areas that humans can’t. By allowing robots to make some of the long-haul early explorations of Mars, humans can take pressure off the physical and mental challenges that Mars is sure to bring. 

Research collected by robots can then be used to adapt and overcome these challenges, making Mars a place humans can someday safely explore.

 Text by Rachel Brooks.