Beginning of the end of Mars One?

The program of sending a man to Mars at one end leaves few people indifferent. It inspires the idea of ​​cosmic colonization, but is risky beyond adventurism. There is a huge amount of technical, biological, financial, organizational, philosophical issues that need to be solved in order for such a flight to become possible. Now the situation has been exacerbated by the accusations of the organizers of the project in impropriety. On March 16, Medium.com interviewed a participant in the program Joseph Roche, a PhD in physics and astrophysics, a professor at the University of Dublin. On March 19, Basa Landsdorp's interview about the feasibility of the Mars One mission appeared, in which he, in turn, accused Joseph of lying. I tried to prepare an analysis of two interviews and a small overview of the news on the technical aspects of the project.

Two interviews

For convenience of perception, I built this part as follows. First comes the statement of Joseph, then the corresponding response from Bass, and, at the end, my comment.

Buying places

Joseph's statement : The candidates list leaders actually bought their seats, getting points for money. The fact is that in the community of Mars One there are points that are awarded for donations to the project and the purchase of things and souvenirs. In February 2015, a list of the “Top 10 Predictors” appeared on the Guardian website, in which the winners of the third round of selection of astronauts were sorted by points.
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Bass Answer : There are many candidates of the third round who have not made a single donation, and many candidates who have not passed to the third round, despite the donations. Donations and selection are unrelated.

Comment : Let's open the list of candidates of the third round on the Mars One site. Indeed, some candidates in the profile did not specify the number of points, which suggests that they did not pay money. Let us check how the lists of candidates of the second and third rounds coincide if we sort them out by points. The lists do not completely coincide - there are people with a large number of points who, nevertheless, did not pass to the third round. The selection news does not say about ranking the list by points; on the contrary, it is stated that in the next selection rounds there will be a check on the possibility of teamwork, and individual leadership does not mean the ability to work successfully in a group. All this does not allow to recognize the accusation of Joseph justified. One can argue about the ethics of having sorting by points, because of which journalists are starting to compile a list of “most promising” candidates, but the organizers can easily disavow him.

Share in fees

Joseph's statement : In February, the winners of the third round received a list of tips on working with the press, in which they are convincingly asked to donate 75% of the fee for the interview.

Bass Answer : We are preparing a contract on the commercial activity of candidates. Having control over the candidates' commercial activity is important in order to avoid their conflict with each other. Candidates are not paid by Mars One yet, so they will have to transfer part of the income from the organization’s commercial interviews. I get paid in Mars One, and all the money from the interview goes to the organization. Many candidates are ready to transfer not just a share, but fees entirely, but this is their own business.

Comment : Bass has logic. If a person is interested in the press as a candidate for Mars One, then why should organizations not make money from it? It is difficult to compare with the state space agencies. For example, in the USA in the 80s any school or institute could ask NASA to send an astronaut to an event, and an astronaut came. NASA is a state agency, so the school is unlikely to pay for it, and, of course, the astronaut did not receive any additional money for such a performance (although they could give something for memory). Further, the astronauts of the first set of NASA signed a contract with the magazine Life, which earned very good money, and this also raised questions. The ethics of listing fees may be questionable, but this is not irrefutable proof of fraud.

Initial number of candidates

Joseph's statement : The initial number of candidates was 2,761, not 200,000, as announced.

Bass Answer : Initially, there were 200,000 statements, we offered the journalist a list, but he was not interested.

Comment : The number of applications is not such an important thing, in my opinion. The desire to exaggerate interest in a program for public relations is understandable, but it does not follow from this that the entire program is a scam. At the same time, if the program eventually turns out to be a scam, it will be an excellent illustration of the argument “they lied to us from the very beginning.”

Bad selection

Joseph's statement : First, it was said that there would be personal interviews by region. Then it was replaced by a ten-minute Skype interview. Medical selection was carried out at the local doctor by the forces of the candidate himself. The Skype interview was a general conversation about Mars and the Mars One mission. At the same time, NASA requires 1,000 hours of flying time just to file an application.

Bass Answer : We started with 200,000 initial statements. Along with the statement went video and answers to the psychological test. Based on this data, we selected about a thousand candidates who had to undergo a medical examination, not much different from the physical examination at NASA. Selected candidates were interviewed by Norbert Kraft, who selected astronauts at JAXA and conducted research related to long-term missions at NASA. Interestingly, the screening process for unsuitable candidates is not as complicated as it may seem. Our next step is to determine who is suitable for the mission and has the necessary qualities. Now the selection process will be much more detailed. We will bring together our candidates, we will subject them to individual and team trials, there will be much longer interviews and a much more numerous selection committee.

Comment : The initial selection of astronauts and astronauts is really simple. NASA criteria are published on their website, and it says that 1000 hours of flying time is an alternative to three years of work in the specialty after graduation from the university. It also says that an alternative to 1000 hours of raid may be a PhD degree or work as a teacher after university. The astronaut recruitment criteria for 2012 are also on the Internet, and the tests listed there can be collected at a regular clinic.

The fun begins next. Bass promises that much more careful selection is starting now. And it is already possible to check. If there are press releases about “individual and team tests”, or, on the contrary, another disappointed candidate will tell about the side work at this stage, this will already be a serious argument.

In addition to the article in Medium, Bass answers other questions about obstacles to the mission.

Question : Is there an agreement with television companies to create a documentary film on the selection of astronauts?
Answer : We were very close to concluding a contract with Endemol, but the deal fell through at the stage of determining the final details. Since November 2014, we have been working with another TV company, there is no final agreement yet, but at the moment the deal looks very promising.

Comment : It is necessary to track the information on this transaction, will it fail?

Q : Will there be enough six billion dollars for a mission?

Answer : According to NASA, the cost of a mission to Mars is estimated at $ 35 billion. But our mission is very different. We will arrange a permanent settlement and do not think about the return, which is the most difficult. The return requires the development of heavier launch vehicles, larger landing systems in order to land the components of the take-off system, and the development of a launch system from Mars. Our valuation of $ 6 billion comes from negotiations with aerospace companies around the world. They are already building systems for the ISS and unmanned missions to Mars, which practically correspond to the systems we need. We are absolutely sure that the budget is enough.

Comment : The main problem here, in my opinion, is the assurance that the irretrievable mission is simpler than landing with return. This is obviously not so easy, because living for years on Mars is not easier than a year to fly and a month to work there. The equipment will fail, parts will be spent, people will get tired. A short landing can be provided on the supply of consumables, a permanent stay will require the use of local resources, and this is not as easy as it may seem. And an error in assessing the complexity of a mission leads to an unrealistically small budget.

Question : How is the process of funding the mission?
Answer : The Mars One mission is funded mainly through investments. We had a very successful fundraising stage in 2013, which was enough for everything we did until today. At the end of 2014, we reached an agreement with a consortium of investors on a much larger stage. Unfortunately, paperwork takes much longer than we expected. I think it will be completed before this summer, which means that we will not have time to finance research for the Lockheed Martin unmanned landing mission. This, unfortunately, means that the mission is shifting to 2020, which, in turn, leads to a shift of the entire program by two years, and the first landing of a man on Mars is now scheduled for 2027.

Comment : Let's wait for the summer and see. Without money, the mission will not be accurate. No bucks - no Buck Rogers. By the way, there is no information about what kind of investors. Ordinary investors want profits, which obviously cannot be here. Who, then, will invest and why?

Question : What does the two-year delay mean for Mars One?

Answer : Getting to Mars is very difficult, NASA says about landing on Mars in 20 years for more than 45 years. Of course, NASA needs a return mission, which is much more difficult than our one-way mission, but it shows the complexity of the task. At the same time, Mars One has already achieved a lot. We signed a contract with Paragon Space Development Corporation for spacesuits and life support systems, the first contract with Lockheed Martin for an unmanned mission, we have very impressive advice from the representatives, including a Nobel Prize winner, and excellent advice from consultants that includes, for example, Mason Peck (Mason Peck), a former NASA chief technical officer. I believe that we are moving according to plan and are on the right track. <...> Will it be a failure if the first humans land on Mars two, four, six or even eight years later? I will be very proud if we succeed, and Mars One is fully committed to this task.

Comment : The first problem is confidence that the mission for some reason will be easier. The second is a detachment of candidates. This technique is ready to wait for years, people grow old and get sick. If the first landing of a person is scheduled for 2027, then the candidates will have to wait for the flight for 11 years - what is the point of selecting and training them now?

Well, the conversation about the delay of 2-4-6-8 years sounds very alarming. If the disembarkation leaves on 2033, then from the initial set will remain units. And yes, it will be like “talking about Mars in 20 years for 45 years in a row.”

Conclusions from the interview
From the interview, it seems to me, it is impossible to draw conclusions about the evil intent of the organizers of Mars One. Joseph Roche was quick to leave the project - he did not provide one hundred percent evidence of fraud. Maybe someone from the remaining hundred candidates will be able to shed light on this question?

Fresh technical aspects

What to sit on?

As you know, for the flight and landing on Mars is supposed to use the ship on the basis of the Dragon's company SpaceX. However, according to the latest news , two landing systems are being developed for Dragon - on engines on the ground, and, in parallel with it, on parachutes on water. The fact is that landing on engines is technically more risky and not mastered. Spaceships that would land on engines were only in the projects, and, obviously, SpaceX wants to insure. The problem is that the history of Gemini can repeat here, when the promising and risky landing system on the drop-in control wing was eventually replaced by the usual parachute landing on parachutes. Delays, accidents, lack of funds, mistrust - all this can lead to the fact that the Dragon will sprout on parachutes. But this system is not suitable for Mars. And in this case, Mars One is waiting for another delay to develop a system for landing on Mars. By the way, there is no information about the contract between Mars One and SpaceX, who knows if there will be problems here too?

How to live?

In November 2014, at the 65th International Astronautics Congress in Toronto, a report was made by MIT scientists on the technical aspects of the life support of the Mars One mission. News agencies wrote that, according to this report, the colonists would die on day 68 from lack of oxygen, but this was taken out of context, because only one of the scenarios in which the life support system worked without using local resources was quoted. In fact, the findings of the report were different:

• The system, which will provide the colonists with food for 100%, will supersaturate the premises of the underground station with oxygen. A special system for removing oxygen from the air will be required to reduce the risk of fire. Such a system in the history of cosmonautics has never been done before.
• The system of use of local resources will take only 8% of the weight of resources that will produce in two years. This is a very nice value, however, the level of readiness of technologies for the extraction of local resources is low, so the accuracy of this assessment leaves much to be desired.
• Spare parts will eventually become the main load. After 130 months they will occupy 62% of all cargo to Mars.
• The most optimistic scenario only for life support systems and the use of local resources requires 15 launches of Falcon Heavy and $ 4.5 billion .

Comment : Mars One is required to create many new technologies, and they obviously do not fit into the budget of $ 6 billion.

Timing shift

The announced deadline is the second in the project history. According to the original plan, which was announced in 2012, already in 2014, a telecommunications satellite, a landing module, a technology demonstrator and a rover were to go to Mars to determine the landing site. According to the latest plans, the satellite with the landing module will be launched in 2020, and the rover - in 2022. And the arrival of a person has shifted from 2023 to 2027. Time shifts for a company that lives on donations, on the one hand, allow us to collect more, on the other hand - increase the cost of ensuring the work of the company. And it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to maintain public interest for decades.

Conclusion

It seems to me that 2015 may be the moment of truth for Mars One. They announced verified plans for 2015, and fraud allegations are undermining their credibility. From what we know now, the charges are not supported by serious evidence. And, honestly, I don’t want Mars One to be scammers - this will cast a shadow on the space enthusiasts and may undermine the credibility of private crowdsourcing projects. On the other hand, if the project ends in failure, this may raise the requirements for the elaboration, reporting and openness of future space projects, which is very good.