Mission To Mars
Imagine you and four other men who you have never met before in your life are trapped. You are to stay in a warehouse in Moscow, the size of a small house, for 520 days. You will have scientists watching your every move, and picking out your clothes and food for you. The goal? To survive the mission and come back sane. The defects of this mission? If you do go crazy there is no way out. If someone else becomes paranoid, you have to live with them for a year and a half in terror that you would be next. Would you consider it worth the experience to be a building block in the mars exploration process? Even if you came back with one or two less members of your team?
Scientists have been to Mars and got useful information, but only through Robots. Before 1970 we had only had successful Mars flyby’s so it is interesting to look at how far we have gotten since then. In 2003 scientists at NASA launched Spirit and Opportunity to take photos and sent them back to earth for us. In case you are confused, Spirit and Opportunity are robotic vehicles that were sent to explore Mars’s surface in search of water or life, otherwise known as Mars Rovers. Spirit has traveled 5 miles but is immobile today and Opportunity has traveled 12 miles and continues to travel about 100 meters per day. We know that their missions have been successful because in the last six years and together they have taken 260,000 images of Mars. That is not the only way to take pictures of Mars, however. Another successful Mars mission was sending the Phoenix Lander in 2007. It is very similar to Spirit and Opportunity because it was sent to get information, but it is different because it was sent to study Mars’s history by looking at the patterns in the polar ice caps. The other difference is that Phoenix is a lander, so unlike Spirit and Opportunity it cannot move. It is shaped like an octagon shaped desk with solar panels sticking out on each side to provide it power. The Phoenix Lander’s last signal was received on November 2. Although scientists have excelled at sending robots to mars, they have also failed, which worries me that there is a small chance that by sending people to Mars there is a risk that they may not come back. I suggest that they send more tests to Mars to confirm what we already know.
From these satellites and robots we have compared Mars to many different places to make it easier to understand. We know that similar to earth, it has volcanoes, valleys, desserts, and ice caps. Its surface is made of sand that can be formed into different shapes and dunes because of the wind caused by its rotation, this is like the earth and its waters. It is also very similar to earth by its surface area, but notice how I said similar, not congruent because Mars is slightly smaller. Unfortunately, Mars’s atmosphere contains only 0.13% oxygen while Earth has 21%., and Mars only has 38% of earth’s gravity, which are helpful aspects of ever surviving there. If we can find more similarities about this planet to ours it would only help theories to form in the next many years to come.
We already know much about Mars, but there is still lots to learn. Scientists all over the world have plans for the mysterious planet. For example, in November of 2011 the US is planning on sending Curiosity, a rover to explore a surface of Mars in search of organic carbon compounds. It’s location has not been set, or at least not released to the public yet. Also, close to 2019 another mission to the moon will take place to compare it’s surface to Mars. I have noticed by looking at time-lines of Mars explorations I feel like there have been long gaps of time before each discovery, if we have been so successful in the past decade who knows if our lucky streak will continue. In my opinion there is still time for research before we decide to make large changes in history.
You have heard a few of my suggestions to scientists already, but I have some important predictions and more suggestions regarding the humans involved in this process. If you were in the spaceship being sent to Mars, would you be able to handle the suspense? I believe that no human mind can go through that amount of time and come back the same way. This is a huge problem that is not being addressed correctly. If scientists keep this plan without changing it, lives could be lost or at least altered. Fortunately, this is the only defect that I have found with the Mission To Mars. Hopefully our first trip to Mars will be a successful one.
Author's Note: Here is my response to our trip to the prairie. We were told to write about our opinions on controlled burnings.
Is it a good idea to burn forests? Yes, it kills all of the dead plants and allows the growing season to extend, as it does when burning a prairie, but my main concern was that the trees that are home for many creatures and took so long to mature, would burn to the ground. After researching I found out that trees like oaks have such thick bark that controlled burnings do no damage to them. Continuing controlled burns does not have any effect on the plants and makes them healthier, I think that burning is just fine for the environment and we shouldn't be concerned about it.
http://www.lcfpd.org/nature_net/index.cfm?fuseaction=nature.burn
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