Speaking at the 2018 Mars Society Convention, SpaceX’s Principal Mars Development Engineer Paul Wooster briefly presented on the company’s BFR and Mars colony ambitions.
While the majority of the 30-minute talk rehashed CEO Elon Musk’s 2017 BFR update and subsequent Reddit AMA, it also happened to contain a handful of new details and slides, including a suggestion that the first BFR spaceships to land on Mars will stay on the Red Planet as temporary habitats or tools for early colonists.
SpaceX Mars architecture features pic.twitter.com/IHOLCbbvRS
— Maxime Lenormand (@MaxLenormand) August 25, 2018
The senior engineer reiterated the company’s aspirational Martian launch targets, featuring two uncrewed cargo BFRs in 2022 and four total BFRs in 2024, two crewed and two uncrewed. Whether or not the lack of change in those dates (provided by Wooster nearly a year after CEO Elon Musk’s identical date reveal in September 2017) asserts that SpaceX’s BFR and Mars research and development remains on track, it almost certainly confirms that the company’s incredibly aggressive targets are here to stay.
Graciously documented by Reddit users /u/theinternetftw and /u/Nehkara and European Space Agency intern Maxime Lenormand, at least partially alleviating the unbelievably atrocious webcast quality, Wooster offered attendees a slightly deeper glimpse into the extensive in-depth planning going on behind the scenes at SpaceX. Almost all of the new slides Wooster presented focused heavily on the technical side of actually planning to create a self-sustaining Martian colony, ranging from locations for any prospective colony to the types of skillsets that would be exceptionally invaluable in early colonists.
And here are some additional considerations pic.twitter.com/jdVJglfHCG
— Maxime Lenormand (@MaxLenormand) August 25, 2018
At this point, it’s entirely possible that SpaceX’s internal team of Mars-focused engineers and experts has already begun to approach or even surpass the detail and value of previous theoretical Martian colonization research from the likes of NASA, ESA, and other space agencies and companies. Still, SpaceX has made it eminently clear that it wants and likely needs to collaborate with independent experts on Mars, life support systems, construction, resource extraction and refinement, and more.
A private Mars workshop recently hosted by SpaceX – likely the first of many to come – evidenced that desire to collaborate with companies, agencies, and researchers that have already put years of effort into analyzing and answering the same questions SpaceX will need to answer to successfully build a sustainable city on Mars
Perhaps the most interesting detail to come out of Wooster’s August 25th talk, however, was the slight affirmation that SpaceX is seriously thinking about leaving the first landed BFR spaceships on Mars indefinitely, although it’s not entirely clear which spaceships he was referring to. According to paraphrased notes taken from the webcast, early BFR spaceships on the Martian surface would remain there to be used as resources (habitats). He subsequently noted that early colonists would “probably” live out of the first landed spaceships, to begin with, suggesting that the uncrewed, cargo-dedicated spaceships would still return to Earth, as they will not feature human-rated life support systems of any of the necessities for living.
Still, multiple other slides in Wooster’s presentation make it clear that the goal from the very beginning of the first BFRs to Mars is to expand living space and infrastructure as quickly as possible, paving the way for the arrival of more and more colonists. It’s extremely likely that a significant number of skilled colonists will be needed to ensure that the colony remains healthy and safe, while also guaranteeing that it can sustainably grow as rapidly as feasible.
Plans are for sending the first 2 cargos as soon as 2022! pic.twitter.com/A5y3HNpIOx
— Maxime Lenormand (@MaxLenormand) August 25, 2018
Even though it certainly wasn’t the “BFR update” Musk suggested was coming soon, Wooster’s presentation provided the best glimpse yet into the extensive analysis and planning SpaceX is undertaking to discern how exactly to best structure its very first colony-focused launches to Mars.
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Using the BFR as a habitat for humans is a temporary solution. The radiation exposure over the long term will most certainly be lethal if humans try to live on the surface of Mars. Particularly after the massive radiation exposure they will have received on the journey. That is if they do not freeze to death after a power failure.
Send a specially designed road header robot there first with a couple of assembly bots. Mr. Musk must have a couple of them sitting around the Boring Company.
All it will take is a few months of boring out a shaft near an underground H2O ice reservoir. The assembly bots can install the air locks, equipment and all the comforts of home. When the first Mars explorers arrive on Mars all they have to do is move into their new spacious, warm and radiation proof home a short walk from the BFR. The bots can even start the farms, the oxygen reserves and do much of the research to determine the best way to live on Mars long before humans arrive. The Mars colony needs miners and aquaponic farmers not astronauts. Send them to Coober Pedy for a few years to get used to it before they go.
We need to see an earth orbit mission and a Moon landing as a proof of operation before becoming confident that a Mars mission can proceed.
2 BFR ships to Mars by 2022 is a very ambitious schedule especially when we realize the engines are not yet built and only a small size prototype is in testing.
We need to see an earth orbit mission and a Moon landing as a proof of operation before becoming confident that a Mars mission can proceed.
They have four years. For comparison, four years ago they hadn't even started trying to land the Falcon 9 yet (first attempted drone ship landing was in January 2015.) Since then, landing has become quite routine and they've introduced the Falcon Heavy and sent a payload out beyond Mars orbit.
We'll see how well the timeline holds. Seems reassuring to have gone 11 months with no slip during it... although I guess when it comes to Mars, slips will always be by 26 months at a time...
We need to see an earth orbit mission and a Moon landing as a proof of operation before becoming confident that a Mars mission can proceed.
Yes, of course, there will orbital tests of BFR before sending one to Mars, but going to the moon would be pointless. Landing on Earth will already have been demonstrated.
I've often wondered about the habitats. .... If it could be designed as three parts that could be used with or without the central crew /habitat section ... a crane, ...
You might be on to a good idea here.
Because Mars gravity is about 1/3 of earths, the sections could be lifted and lowered using 3 or 4 long leg jacks (with wheels to move it sideways).
The most useful habitat would have these sections side by side with connecting walkways at various levels. This way a full mini-city could eventually be realized with minimal on-Mars construction.
However, at least one or two large fuel tank sections will need to remain permanently on Mars to store fuel for future trips.
