Surface activities of the first Mars mission crew, as suggested in phase I of the NASA HEDS reference mission, are discussed in this paper. The HEDS reference mission calls for a two phased approach. In phase I, humans supported by robotic systems will explore the Martian surface, collect and analyze geologic, geophysical, and meteorological data, search for potential permanent base sites, and conduct technology verification experiments. In phase II, a Mars base site will be selected, and the building of a permanent human base will be initiated. In this report two complementary architectures are portrayed. First, a permanent base for 3–6 people consisting of an ISRU unit, two nuclear power systems, a green house, and inflatable habitats and laboratories, built inside adobe structures. Second, a reusable, and resupplyable methane propelled very long range type traverse vehicle capable of collecting and analyzing data, and repairing and deploying scientific payloads during its planned 150 days 4800 km traverse. The very long range traverse vehicle will carry smaller rovers, crawlers, blimps, and an air drill capable of quickly reaching depths beyond 100m. The report presents a global vision of human activities on the surface of Mars at a programmatic level. It consists of several vignettes called "concept architectures". We speculate that these activities will facilitate a phase I Mars exploration architecture.


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    Title :

    The Exploration of Mars: Crew Surface Activities


    Contributors:

    Conference:

    Seventh International Conference and Exposition on Engineering, Construction, Operations, and Business in Space ; 2000 ; Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States


    Published in:

    Space 2000 ; 890-918


    Publication date :

    2000-02-18




    Type of media :

    Conference paper


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English




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