Mars One - Human settlement of Mars in 2023

[Buster's Uncle]

Mars Colony Project Lands First Investors
By Mike Wall | SPACE.com – 4 hrs ago.. .

 
A nonprofit organization that aims to land four astronauts on Mars in 2023 has attracted its first investors for the ambitious $6 billion effort.
 
The Netherlands-based Mars One has secured investments that will help fund conceptual design studies and its astronaut selection program, both of which are slated to kick off soon, officials announced today (Jan. 29).
 
"Raising a few million [US dollars] in the coming months may seem insignificant in the shadow of the pending billions required, but we are taking it one step at a time," Kai Staats, director of business development for Mars One, said in a statement. "These first few bring tangible demonstration to nearly two years in planning. For us, committed funds in this phase of development are an important indicator we are moving in the right direction."
 


Mars One plans to stage a global reality-TV event around the one-way mission, with cameras following every step of the way from astronaut selection to the settlers' first years on the Red Planet. The organization thinks revenues from broadcasting rights and sponsorships will cover most of the costs. [Mars One: 'Big Brother' on Mars? (Video)]

 The new investments should help get the ball rolling. Mars One officials say they will use the money to fund conceptual design studies — engineering bids from private spaceflight companies that aim to provide the spaceships, habitat modules and other major components of the Mars colony — beginning in the first half of this year.
 
Some of the money will also finance Mars One's televised astronaut selection process, which officials have said will also likely launch sometime this year.
 
Earlier this month, Mars One released its astronaut requirements. Applicants must be at least 18 years old, in good mental and physical health and willing to undergo a training program that will last about eight years.
 
Managing the selection process could prove challenging, as Mars One anticipates receiving hundreds of thousands of applications from people interested in becoming Mars colonists.
 
Mars One plans to launch a series of robotic missions between 2016 and 2020 that will build an outpost on the Red Planet. The first four astronauts will arrive in 2023, and more will touch down every two years after that. There are no plans to return these interplanetary pioneers to Earth.
 
The newly announced investments were secured by the Interplanetary Media Group, a daughter company of Mars One that manages the media and intellectual property associated with the Red Planet colonization mission, officials said.

http://news.yahoo.com/mars-colony-project-lands-first-investors-135027114.html

[Dale]

Good to see this is starting to get some cash behind it.   

[Geo]

Well, there was a newspaper article last month about a Belgian (family) man signing up to the candidate list.
His wife appearantly didn't agree, but he'd done it anyway.

[Buster's Uncle]

Mars Colony Project to Begin Astronaut Search in July
By Rob Coppinger, SPACE.com Contributor  | SPACE.com – Tue, Apr 16, 2013...

Artist's depiction of Mars One astronauts and their colony on the Red Planet.

LONDON — A nonprofit organization that aims to land four astronauts on Mars in 2023 will kick off its two-year, televised search for Red Planet explorers this summer.

The Netherlands-based Mars One will begin accepting application videos in July, charging a fee to weed out folks who aren't serious about their candidacy. The group hopes to raise millions of dollars this way, with the proceeds paying for the ongoing selection process and technology studies.

"We expect a million applications with 1-minute videos, and hopefully some of those videos will go viral,” Mars One co-founder and chief executive officer Bas Lansdorp told SPACE.com on April 10. He was in London to speak to the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) that day.

Mars One now has 45,000 people registered for its mailing list and has already received 10,000 emails from interested individuals, Lansdorp added. [Mars One's Red Planet Colony Project (Gallery)]

A one-way trip to Mars

Mars One is casting a wide net, seeking applicants from all over the world. Application fees will vary from country to country, with folks from poorer nations getting a price break, Lansdorp said. The maximum fee will apparently be $25.

Anyone who is at least 18 years old can apply by sending in a video explaining why he or she should be selected. But prospective colonists must be prepared to say goodbye to Earth forever; there are no plans at this point to bring Mars One astronauts home.

By July 2015, Mars One wants to have 24 astronauts, organized into six teams of four people. Those teams then face seven years of training that will include spending three months at a time in a replica of the Mars colony.

"We will give them all the most stressful situations,” Lansdorp told the BIS audience on April 10, adding that the training base will have a 40-minute communications delay to replicate the time lag that would exist due to the vast distance between Earth and Mars.

Mars One officials expect some individuals and teams to fail these tests, so from 2015 on, the nonprofit will have an annual process to select 12 people (in three teams of four).

"We will always have about 10 groups [of four] in training, so if one group drops out, there will be replacement crews," Lansdorp told SPACE.com. This will continue even after 2023, because Mars One plans to send more colonists to the Red Planet every two years for as long as funding levels will allow.



Interplanetary 'Big Brother'

Mars One estimates that it needs $6 billion to send the first four astronauts to Mars. This money will cover developing the landing systems, habitats, Mars Transit Vehicle (MTV), rovers, solar arrays and other technologies associated with the colony, as well as pay for the crew's journey from Earth.

Every subsequent crew trip would cost $4 billion, Lansdorp told SPACE.com. Just sending a supply lander would cost $250 million.

Mars One plans to raise this money largely through a global reality television series that will follow the colonization effort from astronaut selection to the first landing and the settlement’s expansion.

The audience will vote for who gets to go to Mars from a pool of candidates selected by Mars One’s experts. Lansdorp points to the 2012 London Olympics and the $4 billion it generated from television revenues over its three weeks as evidence that such a funding plan can work.

Meanwhile, the application video revenue will finance early technology studies and prove there is demand for a television show. ['Big Brother' on Mars? (Video)]

“We can prove to the broadcasters that there is real demand and interest, and we will start negotiations after the [astronaut] selection procedure begins,” Lansdorp told SPACE.com.

Beyond the applicant videos and television show, future revenues include crowdfunding, exploiting the technologies developed for Earth’s markets and doing research on Mars for governments. For example, Mars One could eventually send samples of Martian soil to Earth, officials say.



Mission details taking shape

While the Mars spacecraft has yet to be designed, Lansdorp told the BIS audience that for the 210-day journey, the vehicle would have a hollow 660-gallon (2,500 liters) water tank with four compartments.

Astronauts would sleep in this area and use it as shelter from extreme solar radiation events. The water equates to a 9.84-inch (25 centimeters) column for radiation protection, which Lansdorp told the BIS is what NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) suggest for a return mission.

When the first team of four lands at the settlement’s location on April 24, 2023, the settlers will find a colony whose habitats and solar arrays started working before they left Earth. Lansdorp told SPACE.com that the colony will be located between 40 and 45 degrees north latitude.

"We want to be as south as possible for sunlight and north enough for water," he said, adding that the colony would be at a location that is 1.55 miles (2.5 kilometers) lower than Mars’ average ground level, to give the arriving spacecraft more time to land.

The colony will initially have rovers, two habitats, two life support landers and two supply landers. Mars One is designing five types of landers for life support, supplies, habitat and those that land the crew and rovers. The first equipment to be sent to Mars will be a communications satellite, a demonstration rover and a 5,500-pound (2,500 kilograms) supply lander, officials said.

"We have a conceptual rover right now. It is very likely there will be two rovers — one trailer rover and one intelligent rover that does all the advanced tasks,” Lansdorp told SPACE.com. The trailer rover will move landers from their landing point to the settlement, a distance not expected to exceed about 1 mile (1.6 km).

The colony’s habitats will be connected by fabric tunnels and covered in 6 feet (1.8 m) of Martian soil, to provide radiation protection. Lansdorp told the BIS audience that with the colony’s expected outdoor activities, the colonists will get a radiation dose over 10 years equal to that of ESA’s maximum allowed for its astronauts, which he described as “very safe."

At the same time the first team lands, the second crew’s habitat lander will also arrive. As well as being ready for the second crew's 2025 arrival, this habitat can be used by the first crew if they encounter problems with their own equipment.

The colony will have inflatable greenhouses and use water from the Martian soil and nitrogen from the atmosphere to grow crops. The crew will cultivate rice, algae and insects for their high protein content and will also likely grow mushrooms, along with tomatoes and other plants. [The Boldest Mars Missions of All Time]



Tapping private industry

Solar rather than nuclear power will be used for the base, Lansdorp said, and all the landers may be larger versions of SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft.

“We’ve discussed upscaling of Dragon capsule with SpaceX,” Lansdorp told the BIS audience.

In March, Mars One announced it had signed a contract with Paragon Space Development Corp. for a conceptual design study into life support and space suit systems.

Paragon has also been contracted by Dennis Tito for his Inspiration Mars project, which aims to launch two people on a Mars flyby mission in 2018 that will neither land on nor orbit the Red Planet. Lansdorp is slated to meet Tito in May in Washington, D.C.

As well as Paragon and SpaceX, Lansdorp is in discussions with Canada’s MDA Robotics for the rovers; Italy’s Thales Alenia Space for the MTV; ILC Dover, Astrobiotic and the U.K.’s Surrey Satellite Technology.

Lansdorp declined to answer questions about how much money Mars One has already raised, saying only that it's enough to start the selection process and to fund the Paragon contract. However, Mars One has named its first investors. Described as silver sponsors, they include Verkkokauppa.com, Finland’s second largest consumer electronics retailer, and Byte Internet, a Web hosting service.

http://news.yahoo.com/mars-colony-project-begin-astronaut-search-july-144550057.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Want to Live on Mars? Private Martian Colony Project Seeks Astronauts
By Clara Moskowitz | SPACE.com – 20 hrs ago...

 
NEW YORK — If a one-way trip to Mars appeals to you, now's the time to apply to be part of the first crew of a Red Planet colony.

The Netherlands-based nonprofit Mars One is planning to fly teams of four astronauts to the Red Planet, with the first landing slated to occur in 2023, exactly 10 years from today (April 22), to establish a human settlement on our planetary neighbor. Today, the organization opened up its astronaut selection process, which it hopes will raise some of the funding for the project.

Those over age 18 interested in spending the rest of their lives in space can apply by submitting applications and short videos to the Mars One site. There is no maximum age for applicants, nor a required technical background or even nationality or language — astronaut candidates will have a few years to learn English if they don't speak it already. [Mars One's Red Planet Colony Project (Gallery)]



Successful applicants will have intelligence, resourcefulness, courage, determination and skill, as well as psychological stability, said Mars One ambassador Gerard 't Hooft, a Nobel Prize-winning theoretical physicist.

"Selecting these people will be a very difficult task," 't Hooft said during a press conference here to announce the selection process. "There shall be no exclusion on the basis of race, nationality, religion and gender."

There will be a minor fee associated with submitting an application, which will range from $5 to $75 depending on the gross national income of the applicant's home country, officials said. The application fee for United States citizens is $38.

Mars One estimates it will need about $6 billion to send the first four inhabitants to start the Red Planet colony, with $4 billion needed to launch each subsequent crew. In addition to the application fees, the organization hopes to raise money via a reality television show that will follow its astronaut selection and training process.

Though a one-way ticket to Mars isn't everyone's idea of a dream getaway, the project's leaders anticipate a high level of enthusiasm for the mission; they've received about 10,000 emails already from people interested in applying. Mars One hopes to recruit astronauts from around the world to create a colony populated by a diverse representation of Earth's inhabitants.

"We want this to be a mission of humanity," Mars One co-founder and chief executive officer Bas Lansdorp told SPACE.com.

Mars One plans to put its astronaut finalists through seven years of training and testing exercises that will expose them to potential situations they might face during the mission. The astronaut trainees will also have to spend some time living in mock Mars colonies on Earth and communicating with Mission Control via a 6 to 20-minute time delay to simulate the lag between a signal being sent and its arrival on Mars.



By July 2015, Mars One plans to have selected its top 24 astronauts, grouped into crews of six.

So far, no spacecraft or rocket has been chosen for the journey, though organization officials say they are considering modifying the Dragon capsule being developed by the private aerospace firm SpaceX (Space Exploration Technologies Corp.). The Mars lander, rovers and habitat modules required will likely have to be designed and built from the ground up, but will be based on existing technology.

"This will not be easy," Lansdorp said. "There is a lot of engineering and testing to be done before the first humans will land. But no new inventions are needed to land humans on Mars. There might be delays, there might be cost overruns, there might even be failures, but it can be done."

The endeavor will begin with an initial test launch to Mars in 2016 to demonstrate the landing technology, with a second mission in 2018 to deliver a robotic rover to scout out landing sites. In 2020 a second rover will launch to Mars to begin assembling some of the first settlers' equipment and habitats, which will be ready and waiting when they land. The trip to Mars will take about seven months.

Mars One has hired the research firm Paragon Space Development Corporation to design the life support technologies needed for the mission.

"There's no doubt that the success of this mission depends on the life support system on the surface of Mars working forever," said Grant Anderson, Paragon chief engineer and co-founder. "To be successful, we have to execute a major and logical problem of applied engineering. We have to do the design, build and then test extensively before we leave."

http://news.yahoo.com/want-live-mars-private-martian-colony-project-seeks-182119773.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Private Mars Colony Won't Seek Life on Red Planet
By Mike Wall | SPACE.com – 3 hrs ago...

 
A private Mars colony project will do its best to avoid disturbing potential Red Planet life rather than aggressively hunt it down.

The Netherlands-based nonprofit Mars One, which opened its astronaut-selection process today (April 22), plans to land four people on the Red Planet in 2023 as the vanguard of a permanent human colony on the Red Planet, with new crews arriving every two years thereafter.

Human explorers and their trillions of microbes will doubtless contaminate whatever site is chosen for the settlement, Mars One officials said, so the organization will try to pick a place unlikely to host indigenous life. [Mars One: Colonizing the Red Planet (Gallery)]

"The most important thing is that you localize the pollution," Mars One CEO and co-founder Bas Lansdorp said during a press conference today. "So you make sure that humans don't go to places where there's the highest chance of finding life, to make sure that if there is life [on Mars], that it will remain preserved."

Mars One is working with experts to minimize the risks its colonization effort may pose to potential Red Planet lifeforms. For example, the group's advisory board includes John Rummel, who chairs the Committee on Space Research's Panel on Planetary Protection, Lansdorp said.

It may be tough to bring those risks down too much. While Mars One hasn't picked a precise location for its settlement yet, the organization is targeting a swath of the Red Planet between 40 and 45 degrees north latitude, Lansdorp said.



Sites within this band likely have enough of two critical resources — subsurface water (in the form of ice) and solar energy — to support a colony, he added. But underground water could also help sustain microbes, whose toughness and near ubiquity continue to amaze scientists, at least here on Earth.

It's unclear at the moment if Mars One— which will fund its ambitious settlement efforts primarily by staging a global reality-TV event around the entire process — will take a serious stab at finding signs of Red Planet life.

Mars One astronauts will not necessarily be scientists, after all. Anyone over the age of 18 is eligible to apply, with the selection committee prizing traits such as intelligence, resourcefulness, determination and psychological stability over academic background, officials said.

"Science is, of course, not the main focus of what we are doing," Lansdorp said. "The main focus is getting those humans there and making sure that they survive."

Crewmembers will take some scientific gear with them, he added, but Mars One officials won't dictate what the experiments should be.

"It's really up to them," Lansdorp said. "There will of course be a budget for equipment that they want to take for scientific research."

http://news.yahoo.com/private-mars-colony-wont-seek-life-red-planet-113808648.html

[Buster's Uncle]

78,000 Apply for Private Mars Colony Project In 2 Weeks
By Mike Wall | SPACE.com – Tue, May 7, 2013...

 
Huge numbers of people on Earth are keen to leave the planet forever and seek a new life homesteading on Mars.

About 78,000 people have applied to become Red Planet colonists with the nonprofit organization Mars One since its application process opened on April 22, officials announced today (May 7). Mars One aims to land four people on the Red Planet in 2023 as the vanguard of a permanent colony, with more astronauts arriving every two years thereafter.

"With 78,000 applications in two weeks, this is turning out to be the most desired job in history," Mars One CEO and co-founder Bas Lansdorp said in a statement. "These numbers put us right on track for our goal of half a million applicants." [Mars One's Red Planet Colony Project (Gallery)]



Mars One estimates that landing four settlers on Mars in 2023 will cost about $6 billion. The Netherlands-based organization plans to pay most of the bills by staging a global reality-TV event, with cameras documenting all phases of the mission from astronaut selection to the colonists' first years on the Red Planet.

The application process extends until Aug. 31. Anyone at least 18 years of age can apply, by submitting to the Mars One website a 1-minute video explaining his or her motivation to become a Red Planet settler. (You can also watch other applicants' videos at the site.)

Mars One charges an application fee, which ranges from $5 to $75 depending on the wealth of the applicant's home country. United States citizens pay $38, Lansdorp said.

When the application process closes, reviewers will pick 50 to 100 candidates from each of the 300 regions around the world that Mars One has identified. By 2015, this pool will be whittled down to a total of 28 to 40 candidates, officials said.

This core group will be split into groups of four, which will train for their one-way Mars mission for about seven years. Finally, an audience vote will pick one of these groups to be humanity's first visitors to the Red Planet.

So far, Mars One has received applications from more than 120 countries, officials said. The United States leads the way with 17,324, followed by China (10,241) and the United Kingdom (3,581). Russia, Mexico, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Argentina and India round out the top 10.

"Mars One is a mission representing all humanity, and its true spirit will be justified only if people from the entire world are represented," Lansdorp said. "I'm proud that this is exactly what we see happening."

The announcement of Mars One's application flood comes in the middle of a big week for manned Mars exploration. Scientists, engineers, NASA officials and a range of other Red Planet exploration advocates are currently meeting in Washington, D.C. for the Humans 2 Mars summit, which runs through Wednesday (May .

And today, famed Apollo 11 moonwalker Buzz Aldrin released his new book, "Mission to Mars: My Vision for Space Exploration" (National Geographic Books), which was written with veteran space reporter (and SPACE.com columnist) Leonard David.

http://news.yahoo.com/78-000-apply-private-mars-colony-project-2-195922459.html

[Buster's Uncle]

China Media Claim Private Mars Colony Mission Is a Scam
By Mike Wall | SPACE.com – Thu, May 23, 2013..

Artist's concept of Mars One astronauts on the Red Planet.

 
Some people may find it hard to believe that a private mission will succeed in landing four astronauts on Mars in 2023, but several state-run media outlets in China are targeting the project with even harsher terms like "hoax" and "hype."

Doubts have been growing in China about the legitimacy of Mars One, the Netherlands-based nonprofit that seeks to establish a colony on the Red Planet 10 years from now. China's People's Daily newspaper, for example, ran a story Tuesday (May 21) headlined "Settlement on Mars a hoax? Over 10,000 Chinese people fall for it."

The headline refers to the 10,000 people from China who have applied to become Mars One astronauts since the organization opened its selection process last month. (Mars One charges a non-refundable application fee that varies from nation to nation; it's $11 for Chinese applicants and $38 for United States citizens.) [Mars One's Red Planet Colony Project (Gallery)]

Journalists discovered that Mars One's registered address is the home of the organization's co-founder and CEO, Bas Lansdorp, in the Dutch city of Amersfoort, People's Daily reported. And its headquarters are based at a rented office, the paper added.

"When the reporters went to the office of the company, they did not see any sign or logo of Mars One," the newspaper reported. "Lansdorp and his colleagues only occupied a few tables in a large open office area. Therefore, media assumed that Mars One project is probably a commercial scam."

People's Daily also said that "a Chinese scholar" regarded Mars One as "blatant commercial hype."


Mars One officials have fought back against the accusations and insinuations, stressing that their ambitious plans are for real.

"Mars One is making good progress on its plans. We have already contracted an American company to start work on the Environmental Control and Life Support System and Mars Surface Exploration Spacesuit System," Mars One's Aashima Dogra told the Global Times (a People's Daily affiliate) via e-mail, according to People's Daily.

That company is Arizona-based Paragon Space Development Corp., whose deal with Mars One was announced in March. Paragon is also working with the nonprofit Inspiration Mars Foundation on its plan to launch two astronauts on a flyby journey around the Red Planet in January 2018.

Lansdorp weighed in as well, telling yet another newspaper via email that it made sense to register the organization at his home address rather than at a rented office. And though delays are possible, the project remains on schedule at the moment, he added.

"Our plan is very complicated, but we knew that when we started," Lansdorp told China Daily, according to People's Daily. "We are committed to landing humans on Mars in 2023."

Lansdorp and other Mars One officials have stressed that the project is indeed feasible, requiring no big technological leaps.

"This mission is based on existing technology," Lansdorp said Tuesday at the Space Tech Expo 2013 conference in Long Beach, Calif. "Almost nothing new is needed. And each step is proved before risking lives on the next one."

Mars One estimates that it will cost about $6 billion to land four astronauts on Mars in 2023. The nonprofit aims to launch additional crews every two years thereafter, at a cost of around $4 billion each.

Mars One plans to foot the bill primarily by staging a global reality-TV event, with cameras documenting all phases of the project from astronaut selection to the colonists' first years on the Red Planet.

These Red Planet missions will all be one-way affairs; there are no plans to bring any of the pioneers back to Earth. Still, more than 80,000 people submitted applications to Mars One in the first two weeks after the selection process opened, officials said.

http://news.yahoo.com/china-media-claim-private-mars-colony-mission-scam-211704550.html

I haven't concealed that I think this is a pie-in-the-sky dream and a bit ridiculous, but no reason to think it a scam just because it's kinda pathetic...

[Geo]

I might wager the high-and-mighty Chinese Communist Party doesn't like freewheelers applyin' for Mars. 

[Buster's Uncle]

Applicants for One-Way Mars Trip to Descend on Washington
SPACE.com
By Tanya Lewis, Staff Writer  18 hours ago 

 
A coterie of aspiring Martians will descend on Washington, D.C. on Saturday (Aug. 3) for the first Million Martian Meeting.

The group consists of applicants for the Mars One mission, a one-way trip to establish a colony on Mars. The meeting will feature talks by Mars Society president and founder Robert Zubrin, Mars One CEO and co-founder Bas Lansdorp, and five Mars One applicants.

Lansdorp announced plans for the Mars One mission in May 2012. The nonprofit Mars One Foundation, based in The Netherlands, plans to land humans on Mars in 2023. Teams of four people will be launched to the Red Planet every two years, and anyone over the age of 18 is eligible to apply.

As of May 7, about 78,000 people had applied for the one-way trip.

The applicants' Facebook group, the Aspiring Martians Group, is organizing Saturday's meeting. After an opening address, Zubrin will address the group via Skype, followed by a guest speaker. Then there will be a screening of the film "One Way Astronaut," an independent documentary about Mars One applicants. Later, five applicants will make presentations, and Lansdorp will give a talk to conclude the event.

Mars One plans to launch and land an unmanned supply mission to the Red Planet in 2016, carrying 5,00 pounds of food and other equipment. An exploration rover is slated to follow in 2018 to scout out the best spot for a human colony. In 2021, the organization plans to install a Mars base consisting of two living units, two life-support units, a second supply unit and two rovers. The first crew of four is slated to launch in September 2022, and scheduled to set foot on Mars in 2023.

Mars One estimates the cost of landing the first four settlers will be about $6 billion. It plans to fund most of this by selling advertising for a reality TV program that would document the mission's progress, from astronaut selection through the settlers' first few years on Mars.

http://news.yahoo.com/applicants-one-way-mars-trip-descend-washington-221923496.html

[Geo]

Wondering which one of those five applicants won't make it on the first four men crew...

[Buster's Uncle]

I wonder if any of them will make it to Mars at all.

[Geo]

Hate to say so, but you're likely right.   

[Buster's Uncle]

Typo:  I wrote "wonder" when I meant "seriously doubt".

Hope I'm wrong.

[JarlWolf]

I might wager the high-and-mighty Chinese Communist Party doesn't like freewheelers applyin' for Mars. 

pfft.. the Chinese are nationalist plutocrats themselves, like they are to judge Capitalists: They are the biggest Capitalists on this planet.


Though we do need some proper Socialism in space methinks... MARS MUST BE RED!