One-way Mars

Thousands of earthlings want to fly on a red planet without a return

Private Dutch company Mars One unfolds a project for preparing for a flight to Mars. With the landing and organization of the colony there. But without returning to Earth.

Private Dutch company Mars One unfolds a project for preparing for a flight to Mars. With the landing and organization of the colony there. But without returning to Earth. It turns out that flying one way is several times cheaper than there and back. Flight with people on board is scheduled for 2024. And last year, the selection of future expedition participants began. For five months, more than 200 thousand applications from 140 countries came. Based on the results of the first round, 1058 people were selected. Almost a third of them are from the USA. 52 - Russians. The realism of the Mars One project has different opinions. Be that as it may, it is very interesting to know who decided to become a candidate for this flight? What kind of people are ready to fly away from the ground and not return?

Nastya Stepanova - candidate for the Mars One team, passed two rounds of selection. She is 27 years old. And she considers the future flight to realize.

Mikhail Burdaev -cosmonaut tester, doctor of technical sciences, full member of the Academy of Cosmonautics named after Tsiolkovsky. In 1967 he came to a detachment of astronauts from the military research institute. In 1973, he proposed to fly Mars. Then he stated that he was ready for an irrevocable flight. He still works in the CPC to them. Gagarin.

Anastasia Stepanova. Photo: Anna Artemyeva/"New Gazeta"

Says Nastya Stepanova: “My father is from the Urals, and I was born in Uzbekistan - my parents worked there. Father wanted to become both a sailor and an astronaut, but became a metallurgist. He conveyed his dreams to me: we had a telescope, and my father and I watched the planets. Space as he seized me, he doesn’t let go. ”

Nastya finished school in ... New Zealand (he says, "it happened"). And she entered in Russia - at the journalism faculty of Moscow State University. In the second year, she learned about the recruitment to the School of Space Journalism, which was led by the cosmonaut Yuri Baturin. Here Nastya found out about the cosmonautics first -hand, but the work after the university was "not about space at all." When I heard in the news about the Mars One program, I realized - this is a way out. I consulted with Baturin. “Participate! - said Yuri Mikhailovich. - Ahead of ten years of preparation. This increases the interest of people in space. This is what we have achieved! "

The first step towards Mars was simple: to shoot a video about yourself. Nastya shot at the Faculty of Journalism, at home (“I have a space room, like an ISS with planets on the ceiling”) and in a star town. This tour has passed.

In the second round of candidates, psychologists were checked - on the questionnaire. Nastya passed again. And in December last year, I met with the organizer of the project by Bas Lansdorp. “He came to Moscow for one day. It was very important to see the man alive, who spun all this. He seemed to me a worthy person. "

- I consider this this way: even if I do not fly, but the project will revive interest in space, in Mars, is already good. Already now, the project gave me acquaintances with interesting people, - Nastya sums up preliminary results.

Now Martians are undergoing medical examinations while at the place of residence: tests, therapist, optometrist - the most general information about the state of health. They don’t take smokers: they have a painful reaction to irradiation, higher the risk of cancer.

Next year, selected applicants will go to the United States for the following test: three weeks of life in modules imitating Martian. After that, there will be 24 participants - six crews of four people. They will become employees of the Mars One , they will pay their salaries for preparation, train and teach. You will have to learn everything that can be needed in flight and at a new place of residence: chemistry, physics, agriculture, surgery, technologies ... The exams promise the most serious exams: who does not pass - fly out, and a new person will take in his place.

- And what about personal life? Refuse? - I ask Nastya.

- I do not reject the opportunity to meet a person whom I will love, I do not exclude that we will get married, there can be children. Mom, of course, is against it, and dad supports me. It’s hard for me to imagine how it is to leave my child forever. I think this will be the most difficult.

- But the “candidate for husbands” will have to make your decision to fly away forever?

-Of course, but maybe it will be one of the participants. Anyway, no one knows what will happen to the project in ten years. I think it may well be possible to return to Earth.

“But for now, this is a one -way flight.” Scares?

- It's scary. Only four people, an unpredictable environment. But I really want to try. Leave a mark in history.

Mikhail Burdaev. Photo: Anna Artemyeva/"New Gazeta"

The option of a spacecraft and a candidate for a flight for Mars in 1973 was proposed by astronaut Mikhail Burdaev. This was written in the press as a flight "with a one -way ticket."

“I had a completely different proposal,” objects Mikhail Nikolaevich. - I came to the detachment of astronauts from the military research institute. He was engaged in ballistics, navigation, space ships, by then he was already a candidate of sciences. Gagarin had an offer to recruit cosmonauts from space technology developers. Then there was work on the lunar program, which, unfortunately, was closed in 1974. The Americans flew to the moon before us. And we all classified and pretended that we consider flying to the moon a nonsense.

Burdaev studied the technical projects of ships from the lunar "Union". It was a “union 7k” for the crew, the Soyuz 9k missile block and a tanker ship with Soyuz 11k fuel. The composition of the bunch of ships for flying in Mars was required to significantly increase, but it was possible to use the same ships and their launch vehicles that were already designed in the Queen of the Queen for the lunar version. It was necessary to develop only a module for goods and a fuel reserve. It was the easiest and cheapest version of the device for flying to Mars.

Burdaev spoke about his calculations in TsNIIMASH. There, the “Martian” proposal reacted positively: “Just break through, we will lick the trajectory for you as for ourselves” ...

Burdaev spoke about his plan at the production meeting. Such fees on Mondays were held by Volynov, and the astronauts called them "tricks." Burdaev told both technical capabilities and readiness to fly to Mars alone. They talked about the return. This is a more difficult task than taking off: you will enter the atmosphere at full speed - the descent device will burn. And in order to gradually drop speed, you need to get into the corridor of the entrance - a very narrow zone on the atmosphere. At the same time, there is a danger of jumping into space again (you will not return soon, if you come back at all). And someone asked: "What will you do if you can’t return?"

“I replied that I was ready to perform all management operations and bring the ship to Earth,” recalls Mikhail Nikolaevich. - And if it doesn’t work out ... Here I said half -joking that I was ready for such a turn: the flight may be without return, I will finish all the work and shoot myself.

How this story leaked into newspapers, Burdaev does not know. But the journalists “sentenced” him: the astronaut Burdaev wanted to die on Mars.

- Yes, I did not want and was not going to at all. I knew that there was the possibility of a flight with a return that I was prepared for this flight. So did Amundsen, Scott - people risked and even died, but knew what they were going to.

The idea of ​​Burdaev, in the end, was not supported, even reproached: self -promotion, the desire to fly at all costs. Although Burdaev is now sure that the flight with a return was possible: “Can you imagine, the Soviet man would fly around Mars? And the point is not only in the championship, in political dividends, to which we have always very much strove. You could take pictures from close range. I am still lectures to astronauts on visual observations. 80% of the information that astronauts bring from orbit are visual observations captured by the camera. ”

- It is difficult to prepare for space flight, because apply for participation in Mars Could everyone ?

- In our time, there was no open competition for the selection of candidates for astronauts. A special commission was engaged in selection. The first obstacle is anthropometric data: the growth of the astronaut should be no more than 180 cm, weight - up to 80 kg. And I have growth - 183 centimeters, weight 97 kilograms. I understood that I would not go. But they told me: there are no healthy scientists, go go. I drove the weight, however, went too far: for six months - 20 kg. Then he returned to 80. And he passed. And then all 16 years of preparation for the flight held weight. Four times a week, physical training for two hours, during self -training almost every day - football. The first set of astronauts played hockey, but later it was canceled - a traumatic sport. We were prepared not for records, but for maximum performance in conditions of stress. There were training for survival in different climatic zones: in the tundra, in the mountains, in the desert. Today, the preparation has become more sparing. And in those days they were reinsured, checked on us how a person tolerates weightlessness, overload, vibrations.

- And professional knowledge?

- The astronauts joked: "They took health, but they asked by the mind." Once I was given a pack of American newspapers at work and offered to write an answer for an interview with American astronauts who underwent training in our center. They complained that the Russians give too much knowledge, completely unnecessary. I then wrote that it is impossible to prepare locksmiths and plumbers working from a fence to lunch, you need high -class professionals who can cope with any situation.

- Is psychological training also important?

- I think here is little preparation. High stability is needed by nature. The astronaut must transfer the restriction of mobility, isolation, existence in a closed limited space. But the biggest difficulty: a year after year to prepare for the flight and not to fly. There is a record holder from the Cosmonauts detachment: he has been preparing 25 years and still did not fly. I have been preparing for 16 years. But science saved me. He came to the detachment as a candidate of sciences, in 1987 he became a doctor, in 1994-a professor. Scientific work to some extent justified the waste of time to wait for the failed flight.

- Have you discussed the Mars One project with the astronauts?

-At a press conference, after returning from space in September last year, Pavel Vinogradov answered the journalist’s question: “This is more of some kind of bravado to fly one way. I do not support it. " The head of the Cosmonauts training center, Sergei Krikalev, responded even more sharply: “When people are going to fly to Mars one way, this is already a clinic, this should already be contacted by a psychiatrist.” It is worth reminding that Krikalev is a record holder for the time of stay in space: 803 days for six starts. About five years ago, they asked me a question: "If you were offered to fly into space today, what would you answer?" I can repeat today: I will fly without hesitation.

- Why do we need Mars?

- The development of celestial bodies can give humanity many new knowledge and benefits. On the moon, for example, they discovered a lot of helium-3. In America, there is a company that is going to mine minerals on asteroids. In the distant perspective, Mars can become a base for the resettlement of earthlings and for flights to other planets.

But I somehow flew over Yamal by helicopter. Bumps, lakes, desolation. And I looked down and thought: this is the earth, there is an atmosphere, water, a suitable temperature for life, tremendous wealth underground. Why do we need Mars? We did not master the whole land.

There is Latin Maxim: Navigare Necesse Est , Vivere Non Est Necess - "It is necessary to go to sea, it is not necessary to live." From ancient times to this day it inspires those who believe that cognition is more expensive than life.

Help "New"

The author and manager of the project Mars One Bas Lansdorp graduated from the magistracy at Twente University in the Netherlands, worked at the Delfta Technical University, and then took up business. I thought about creating a colony on Mars at the university. And the idea of ​​how to get money for this was born when Lansdorp found out what profit was broadcast by the Olympic Games. He decided that you can earn part of the funds for the project by organizing a reality show: to translate the preparation of crews, flight and life on Mars in constant mode.

The realism of the Mars One project confirms participation in the development of the first experimental intelligence unmanned landing module, which should fly to Mars in 2018, the famous company Lockheed Martin (developed and made the NASA Phoenix planting module, which landed on Mars in 2008). Another Mars One partner is Space Exploration Technologies Corporation (SpaceX) - an American company, manufacturer of Falcon space missiles.

Mars One program in action

By 2015, 24 candidates who will be invited to the United States will be selected. Real preparation will begin there.

The technique is also preparing.

- Since the beginning of 2014, we began to create the first experimental intelligence unmanned landing module, which should fly to Mars in 2018. The famous company Lockheed Martin (developed and made the NASA Phoenix landing module, which landed on Mars in 2008) took up its development. Another Mars One partner is Space Exploration Technologies Corporation (SpaceX) -the American manufacturing company Falcon space missiles.

- In 2020, a flight to Mars of an unmanned margin was planned.

-In 2022-the launch of goods: two residential blocks, two-with life support systems and two more warehouses. In 2023, the goods will be delivered to Mars, and the Marshod will begin to prepare the base for the arrival of people.

-In April-May of 2024, the land orbit will be sent: a transit module, a Marslander ship (landing module) with a crew of collectors on board and two accelerated steps.

-In September 2024, the first four of the mission will change the assembly crew, and the first manned ship will go to Mars.

- In 2025, the crew will land on Mars in the landing module (transit will remain to fly in orbit around the Sun). At the same time, the load will be sent for the life support of the second crew.

-In 2027-the landing of the next group of four, sending new freight modules, all-terrain vehicles and equipment. And so every two years.

- By 2035 - the population of the colony should reach 20 people.