Case for Mars

Indeed, there was little public dialogue at all regarding a human mission to Mars in the decade after the rejection of such an undertaking by the Nixon administra­tion. By the late 1970s, however, the goal of human exploration of Mars reappeared within the aerospace community—primarily due to the work of a small group of space enthusiasts that became known as the “Mars Underground.” The movement began in 1978, during the quiet period between the Skylab and Shuttle programs. That year, Chris McKay, an astrogeophysics graduate student at the University of Colorado at Boulder, offered an informal seminar on “The Habitability of Mars.” Among the roughly 25 participants were fellow doctoral candidates Carol Stoker and Penelope Boston, engineer Tom Meyer, and computer scientist Steve Welch. The study, which concentrated primarily on the examination of potential Martian terraforming,[60] continued for several years.[61]

In the spring of 1980, McKay and Boston met Leonard David of the National Space Institute at an American Astronautical Society meeting in Washington, DC. After a lengthy discussion regarding Mars exploration, David suggested that the Mars Underground organize a conference to analyze options for near-future human exploration of the red planet. The group of twenty-something graduate students enthusiastically latched onto the idea and began planning the event for the fol­lowing year. McKay, Stoker, Boston, Meyer, Welch, and Roger Wilson, another University of Colorado graduate student, sketched out the key areas to be investi­gated, including: propulsion, design, psychology, medicine, finance, life support, and materials processing. As the idea progressed, they began putting together lists of speakers for what they dubbed the “Case for Mars” conference.[62]

In late April 1981, the Mars Underground hosted the first “Case for Mars” con­ference at the University of Colorado. It was a relatively small conference, with approximately 100 attendees, but to the organizers it was viewed as an important start. Given that no official report on human missions to Mars had been released in a decade, the gathering was largely an organized brainstorming session. Over four days, workshops and presentations were given on a wide variety of topics. The most important outcomes of the conference were “first, that the participants made con­tact and communicated their ideas to the public, and secondly, [the development of] an approach to begin answering the questions of whether or not a manned Mars mission was a viable option for our space program.”[63]

During the four days of the Case for Mars conference, the participants examined not only the technologies required to carry out a future human mission, but assessed the social, economic, and political impacts of such an enterprise. The general con­sensus of the conference participants was that the exploration and settlement of Mars offered a technically feasible, unifying goal for the American space program in the 21st century. The proceedings stated, “this is not only a natural evolutionary step of space development, but it can be a new symbol of the pioneering spirit of America in the eyes of the public.” Mars was seen as a logical next step for the space program because the Martian environment provided resources that could be utilized for in situ manufacturing of life support materials. It was assumed at the time that the Space Shuttle would provide cheap space transportation services, resulting in a Mars expedition that would cost less than the Apollo program.[64]

The attendees produced a list of four precursor missions that would be required before attempting a human landing on Mars. First, to identify a suitable base site, a robotic Mars Polar Orbiter would be required to locate water resources to support the crew. Second, high resolution maps were needed to provide topographic and geological data since the base must be in a safe but scientifically interesting location. Third, a sample return mission would be essential to carryout engineering proof – of-concept tests. Finally, a mission to either Phobos or Deimos was included as a potential launching point for extensive exploration of the Martian surface.[65] The participants produced interrelated technology options to be used when designing the mission profile, which ranged from using a modified Space Shuttle External Tank as a Mars transit vehicle to mining the Martian atmosphere for fuel to artificial gravity. In conclusion, the conferees produced a list of surface activities that could be carried out by the astronaut and scientist crew during its stay. This included construction of underground habitats in a region with access to a confirmable water supply, establishment of processing facilities to utilize Martian resources (to provide air, water, fuel, industrial compounds, building materials, fertilizers, and soil), grow­ing fresh food to supplement stored supplies, and conducting scientific research.[66]

The Case for Mars conferences, which continued every three years until the mid – 1990s when the Mars Society was created (this advocacy organization now holds an annual conference), were essentially a resurrection of the “softening up” process that had been started by the space community during the 1950s. Each conference built on those preceding it, spending time studying the fundamentals of spaceflight (from payloads to orbital trajectories) and establishing a close-knit community of engineers and scientists enthusiastic about sending humans to Mars. In 1984, the second conference was utilized to design a complete space system architecture for a Mars expedition. More importantly, however, the conference attracted attend­ees with greater political influence within the space policy community, among them former NASA Administrator Thomas Paine. The following year, Paine was appointed to lead a blue-ribbon presidential committee tasked with making recom­mendations for the space agency’s future.