Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V08/V8_242.TXT

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From ota Fri Jun  3 03:04:40 1988
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Date: Fri, 3 Jun 88 03:04:24 PDT
From: Ted Anderson <ota>
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Subject: SPACE Digest V8 #242

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 8 : Issue 242

Today's Topics:
                   Re: Mars
            Re: Shooting the Moon
            Re: Shooting the Moon
          Vocabulary lesson #6:  Joint Mars Mission
            Re: Shooting the Moon
                 Mars Landing
          Re: Radar (was Shooting the Moon)
            Re: Shooting the Moon
       Re: Question about Richard Hoagland/Mars Project
          Re: Radar (was Shooting the Moon)
              When in doubt, nuke it...
            Re: Shooting the Moon
            Re: Shooting the Moon
              Shooting the Moon
            Re: When in doubt, nuke it...
            Re: When in doubt, nuke it...
            Re: When in doubt, nuke it...
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 5 May 88 16:45:20 GMT
From: mnetor!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Mars

> If any of the probes sent there weren't properly sterilised before
> launch, colonies of bacteria could still be living in the remains of
> the (hard or soft) lander.

I believe that at least one of the early Soviet hard-landers is thought
*not* to have been sterilized.  Oh well.

 Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
{ihnp4,decvax,uunet!mnetor}!utzoo!henry

------------------------------

Date: 6 May 88 17:43:34 GMT
From: paul.rutgers.edu!styx.rutgers.edu![e-mail]  (Steve Masticola)
Subject: Re: Shooting the Moon

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] ({JOAT}) writes:

> Why does it have to be a nuclear explosion?, why not a small chemical
> charge.

Serious answers: Thermite might work better than explosives, because an
explosion (as was pointed out earlier) might just uncover buried rock.

On the other hand, the explosives or thermite required would be massive,
maybe prohibitively so. Maybe the cheapest answer is radar imaging on
the lander and fine enough steerability to avoid the boulders. If
there's a way to use the radar after it landed, great!

But then again, two Vikings got down without landing on a boulder,
didn't they? So maybe imaging radars and fancy boulder-avoidance
hardware isn't really needed.  (Flame anticipation: Yeah, I know they
could have come down on a rock.  The point is that they didn't, twice.
I think this conclusively proves that it's possible to land unmanned
vehicles on Mars without nuclear pyrotechnics.)

Flippant answer: The use of a technically elegant solution would prevent
the Curtiss LeMays from using atom bombs on the Koreans _sorry_
Vietnamese _er_ the Iranians _whoops!_ Mars. Let the big kids have some
fun once in awhile, why dontcha? Just a little one? Aw, come on, it's
just a little city _I mean_ planet...

------------------------------

Date: 6 May 88 08:49:50 GMT
From: [e-mail]  (Steven Kent Jensen)
Subject: Re: Shooting the Moon

        I personally would not support the detonation of an atomic
weapon on Mars because of the amount of scientific data that we would
lose.  BUT as a concept I approve whole-heartedly.  Part of the problem
with the space program is that the imagination has bled from NASA, in
fact it has bled from the whole country.  If you ask someone why they do
something a certain way they will most likely tell you that that was the
way it had always been done.  America needs to start THINKING, and not
just along the same, old lines.

                                Steven Jensen

------------------------------

Reply-To: pnet01![e-mail]
Date: Fri, 6 May 88 19:31:34 PDT
From: [e-mail] (Jim Bowery)
To: crash![e-mail]
Subject: Vocabulary lesson #6:  Joint Mars Mission

Joint Mars Mission, n, a diabolically clever Soviet plot to destroy
American leadership in space by allowing NASA to take credit for Soviet
space accomplishments and thus lulling the American populace into
believing that they have a space program.

ARPA: crash!pnet01![e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 6 May 88 20:57:15 GMT
From: tektronix!reed![e-mail]  (P Douglas Reeder)
Subject: Re: Shooting the Moon

Is 1m resolution the only way to tell if there are 1m rocks at your
Martian landing site?  Is there no computer processing method that could
dectect surface roughness and tell you there are 1m rocks without being
able to say exactly where they are?

------------------------------

Date: 6 May 88 18:37:31 GMT
From: ganelon.usc.edu![e-mail]  (Steve)
Subject: Mars Landing

All this talk about nuclear detonations on Mars sounds totally
unnecessary.

No accurate data on landing sites?  How did we land the Viking which
tolerates much less than 1m boulders?

If Viking did its own maneuvering, which I don't think it did, at least
we know that terrain very well now, why not land the rover right next to
it, and go for a walk.

=Steve=

------------------------------

Date: 7 May 88 20:18:29 GMT
From: pioneer![e-mail]  (Eugene N. Miya)
Subject: Re: Radar (was Shooting the Moon)

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Steve Masticola) writes:
>massive, maybe prohibitively so. Maybe the cheapest answer is radar
>imaging on the lander and fine enough steerability to avoid the
>boulders. If there's a way to use the radar after it landed, great!

I'm amazed that you guys are so infatuated with radar (imaging).  Sure
for the final decent, but 1 and 3 meter mapping?  We have a ways to go
to understand how it works.  Mars is one of the last planets RSAG wants
to image.  Processing equipment is very heavy.  Seasat images took 2
weeks to process adequately.  The DC-8 up here is just about ready for
JPL missions I occasionally see some of the guys up here.

On Curtis LeMay:
I just saw "Wild Blue Yonder" this morning before driving into work.
Drop that phorphous!

--eugene miya, NASA Ames Research Center, [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 7 May 88 15:58:39 GMT
From: portal!cup.portal.com![e-mail]
Subject: Re: Shooting the Moon

   Aside from the technological considerations of nuking Mars to provide
a landing site, there is the matter of aesthetics.
   Nuking Mars would be a crudity akin to spray-painting directions to
your party in 100-ft letters on the Grand Canyon. A cosmic act of
inconsideration by a F-T-Universe species. It'd make us look bad.
   Even if it works.
--Daniel

------------------------------

Date: 9 May 88 15:55:52 GMT
From: [e-mail]  (Mike Smithwick)
Subject: Re: Question about Richard Hoagland/Mars Project

>  Hoagland is generally regarded as a nut.

Ahhhhh, but a very entertaining nut! I saw him at a local L-5 meeting a
few years back, and found his talk utterly preposterous, but fun.

>NASA is to spaceflight as            |  Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
>the Post Office is to mail.          | {ihnp4,decvax,uunet!mnetor}!utzoo!henry

Perhaps, but the PO is largely independent, whereas NASA is run by a
bunch of lawyers (read : "congresscritters") who think they know about
science.

------------------------------

Date: 9 May 88 17:33:22 GMT
From: phri!dasys1![e-mail]  (Tom Neff)
Subject: Re: Radar (was Shooting the Moon)

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Eugene N. Miya) writes:
>...  Mars is one of the last planets RSAG wants to image.  Processing
>equipment is very heavy.  Seasat images took 2 weeks to process
>adequately...

Good, another reason for a joint mission.  Ivan eats heavy payloads for
breakfast.

And why does a 2 week processing turnaround matter in this context?  If
the imaging is being done in support of an unmanned lander mission, just
park the orbiter/lander assembly in orbit until JPL can decipher the
data and make a decision.  If it's in support of a manned mission, you
could ALMOST do the same thing (hell, it takes them a year to get there,
there ought to be two weeks' worth of stuff to do before landing), but
more appropriately you could use an unmanned orbiter launched to arrive
months beforehand.

Anyway if this were part of an actual Mars mission you have to believe
that more supercomputer resources would be online for you guys, and more
manpower too.  Would it REALLY still take 2 weeks?

Tom Neff

------------------------------

Date:           Mon, 16 May 88 14:46:59 PDT
From: Dana Myers <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Cc: [e-mail]
Subject:        When in doubt, nuke it...


>Date: 29 Apr 88 16:27:42 GMT
>From: [e-mail]  (Paul A. Flaherty)
>Subject: Shooting the Moon
>
>I'm currently involved with the joint Stanford - JPL mission to Mars;
>for those of you who don't know about this, we're looking at placing an
>orbiter in sun - sync, two repeaters in "Molniya" orbits, and landing a
>pair of rovers.
>
>The biggest problem we're faced with at the moment is landing site
>selection, and crash landing aviodance, eg., not putting down on top of
>a large boulder.  This is a rather difficult proposition, since the
>best hi-res photography we'll be able to get will have about 3m
>resolution (pessimistically), and we can, at best, tolerate 1m
>boulders.

  How did Viking accomplish this? Luck?

>For this reason, my design partner and I have proposed a radical
>approach: build a landing site.  The site would consist of a two
>kilometer wide flat landing strip, which will be easily visible to the
>lander.  Construction benefits would include knowledge of regional
>atmospherics, seismic data generation, and lander simplification.

>Unfortunately, since Mars is currently uninhabited, we cannot simply
>hire a construction crew.  Therefore, we are forced to consider a
>simple, engineered solution to landing field construction.

  Mars may not be currently uninhabited. We (Earthlings) currently view
it as such. This is a very important difference. The bottom line is that
it is not inhabited by know contractors.

>The explosion of a 35 kiloton nuclear device, optomized for heat blast,
>at approximately 100m above the Martian surface, would create a
>glass-smooth landing pad, with the required dimensions, and the above
>stated benefits.

  I am not convinced that you would get the "glass smooth" landing pad
you expect. Also, the integrity of the pad may not be too wonderful.
There could be "soft spots" in the middle of your landing pad waiting
for your lander to fall in. In terms of science, detonating a nuclear
device isn't exactly a low impact incident on ANY planet's ecology.

  You would get one benefit for sure. You would distinguish yourself as
the one to make the first act of nuclear violence on another planet.

>No, this is not a joke.  We're very serious about this.

   Go ask someone who lived through Hiroshima or Nagasaki -- imagine if
someone decided YOUR backyard was going to be a nuke-prepared landing
pad and they couldn't see anything in the way 'coz their cameras
couldn't see anything smaller than 10 feet big. How would you feel?
You'd probably be upset enough if someone landed a big helicopter in
your back yard, much less a spacecraft without nuking your yard first.

  Try to keep a "do unto others (other planets, lifeforms, etc.) as you
wish them to do unto you" attitude. It would ruin your (not to mention
my) day if the (currently undiscovered) Martians retaliated for the
nuclear attack with attimatter weapons. At the very least, you may
corrupt some otherwise interesting scientific data.

>I'd appreciate comments / suggestions on this proposal.

Dana H. Myers, WA6ZGB        | "The proposal to nuke Mars for a landing
Locus Computing Corp.        |  pad is clear evidence that STANFORD
Santa Monica, CA        |  isn't doing any in-house drug testing."
                |        -- Dana Myers

------------------------------

Date: 17 May 88 18:56:40 GMT
From: killer!tness7!tness1!sugar![e-mail]  (Peter da Silva)
Subject: Re: Shooting the Moon

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] writes:
> Nuking Mars would be a crudity akin to spray-painting directions to
> your party in 100-ft letters on the Grand Canyon. A cosmic act of
> inconsideration by a F-T-Universe species. It'd make us look bad.

Why? What good is Mars? It doesn't even have an ecosystem. There's a lot
to be said for just busting the thing wide open and making a bunch of
useful asteroids. Venus, too... in fact you could make a better case for
Venus.

But there's really no hurry. There are plenty of asteroids out there
yet.  Let Mars lie fallow for a while. Hell, we haven't even gotten a
decent start on the moon.

-- Peter da Silva

------------------------------

Date: 16 May 88 20:23:24 GMT
From: uflorida!novavax!midas![e-mail]  (Mark Kraieski)
Subject: Re: Shooting the Moon

in article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Paul A. Flaherty) says:
> No, this is not a joke.  We're very serious about this.
>
> I'd appreciate comments / suggestions on this proposal.

Great idea!  But one warhead may not be enough.  I know, since we are
cozying up to the Ruskies so much on space stuff, lets combine all of
our warheads and all of theirs and ship the whole load to Mars.  We
could even send high government officials along to make sure it works!

Seriously, if the best our scientists can come up with for landing a
craft on uneven terrain is thermo nuclear destruction then I fear the
end is near!  This is like using a rocket launcher for geese.

Mark E. Kraieski
Gould, CSD
Ft. Lauderdale

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 19 May 88 14:53:57 EDT
From: [e-mail]
To: paul.rutgers.edu!styx.rutgers.edu![e-mail]
Cc: [e-mail]
Subject: Shooting the Moon

Not only that but the resolution of a spysat going around Mars is bound
to be better than the same resolution around Earth. The reason for this
is that LMO (Low Mars Orbit) is much lower than LEO (Low Earth Orbit).

    Danny

------------------------------

Date: 19 May 88 19:58:57 GMT
From: pacbell!cogent!uop![e-mail]  (Dr. Nethack)
Subject: Re: When in doubt, nuke it...

Why not use a "Daisy cutter"? Worked well in Vietnam, and non nuclear!

I would rather they use X-ray imaging to explore the landing zone first,
maybe with some other specrtal things thrown in for good measure.

I hardly think this is a supreme problem necessitating a nuclear device.

------------------------------

Date: 19 May 88 19:28:17 GMT
From: devvax!jplpro![e-mail]  (Lee Mellinger)
Subject: Re: When in doubt, nuke it...

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Dana Myers) writes:
|  How did Viking accomplish this? Luck?

Mostly, yes.  The Viking orbiters surveyed the surface for several weeks
prior to choosing a landing site.  I don't remember the resolution, but
it certainly wasn't 3m.  The most benign location was chosen from the
pictures made during that survey.  You've probably seen the pictures
from these "benign" locations.  Lander 1 came down about 10m from a
boulder that would certainly destroyed it had it landed there.

Lee
|Lee F. Mellinger                         Jet Propulsion Laboratory - NASA|

------------------------------

Date: 20 May 88 16:37:43 GMT
From: concertina![e-mail]  (Steve Hix)
Subject: Re: When in doubt, nuke it...

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Dr. Nethack) writes:
> Why not use a "Daisy cutter"? Worked well in Vietnam, and non nuclear!

Do you remember how much one weighs and how big it is?

You'd do better to haul 1500 pounds of foam rubber for a self-carried
landing mat.  :}

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V8 #242
*******************