NASA Attends Stealthy SpaceX Mars Meeting (Shh!) (Update)
SpaceX organizes inaugural conference to plan landings on Mars, Ars Technica
“This appears to be the first meeting of such magnitude, however, with nearly 60 key scientists and engineers from industry, academia, and government attending the workshop, including a handful of leaders from NASA’s Mars exploration program. The invitation for the inaugural Mars meeting encourages participants to contribute to “active discussions regarding what will be needed to make such missions happen.” Attendees are being asked to not publicize the workshop or their attendance.”
Keith’s note: Looks like NASA may be having some second doubts about its own #JourneyToMars thing – or what is left of it – and are seeking out alternatives. Smart. Of course no one is talking about this at SpaceX, NASA, or CU. Kudos to Eric Berger.
Keith’s update: I am still waiting for NASA HQ to admit that it’s people are at this meeting even though I know that they are. As for the admonition to attendees not to talk about the meeting or their attendance, well, there’s always Twitter.
Still waiting for @NASA to confirm that it actually has staff at the secret @SpaceX Mars meeting at University of Colorado – and what they are talking about.
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) August 7, 2018
This is the secret @SpaceX Mars workshop at @CUBoulder that attendees are not supposed to be talking about. Shh! https://t.co/4Wtrkrwl4N
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) August 7, 2018
I am so glad to see SpaceX pushing the envelope on this.
I watched man land on the moon. I watched the first, and many other shuttle flights. And I’ve watched NASA talk about Mars and come out with shuttle follow-on plans every year or two for over a decade. All while spending huge quantities of money.
Yet SpaceX is really trying to do it. They are the NASA of the 2010’s.
Oh, Baloney.
in the last 8 years:
1) NASA returned data on two ocean worlds geysering into space, even sampling one of them.
2) Has two rovers actually on the surface of Mars, not just glossy art, plus routinely uses an orbiting communications and spy-satellite network there.
3) Has a spacecraft orbiting asteroids using ion-propulsion.
4) Is exploring Jupiter and just competed a detailed exploration of Saturn.
5) Has had spacecraft survive to enter friggin’ _interplanetary_ space.
6) Skimmed low over the surface of Mercury, even finding ice there.
7) Is about to launch a probe into the solar corona.
NASA is the NASA of the 2010s.
I’m talking about manned spaceflight progress post-shuttle.
I understood what you meant, and you have a point, but you dissed all of NASA. That includes the thousands of folks who advance aircraft design, build world class spacecraft and communication networks, make science discoveries in deep and near space, help us understand our Earth’s environment, and so much more.
Yes, lots and lots of eye candy, but what about the settlement of the Solar System? It’s time we moved beyond mere science to start the settlement of space.
All of that exploration that I listed is just “eye-candy” to you? So you would propose that we just show up one day on, say, Mars without ever having scoped out the landing sites, without understanding where the resources and dangers are, having no clearly defined scientific targets for the explorers, without characterizing the weather, or developing the know-how to move about, run machinery, and so on?
Right, then! Let’s stop all this “eye-candy” nonsense that costs a tiny fraction of a human mission. Let’s forget all this work that enables a human mission. Let’s disengage the public and Congress who respond positively to the “eye-candy”. Then, magically, without knowledge or money or competence, we will all just go settle the solar system. Its just so easy.
Unfortunately, NASA does have a little bit of a problem with “eye candy.” There is, on science missions, an emphasis on spectacular images and discoveries. Dull, routine but excellent science doesn’t get the same attention. For example, you mention how manned missions to Mars would need someone to “characterizing the weather.”
One of the right way to do that involve something like a small spacecraft in synchronous orbit, taking low-resolution images (well images in multiple filters) of most of a hemisphere. One set of images per hour, repeated endlessly (with replacement satellites so it really is endlessly.) Another right way to do it is multiple surface meteorology stations, with simple instruments on a mast, which just measures things like temperature, wind speed and pressure, again, endlessly.
But missions like that aren’t spectacular, and don’t produce “eye candy.” Somehow they never end up being priorities.
“1) NASA returned data on two ocean worlds geysering into space, even sampling one of them.”
All of the reports of a plume on Europa (not a geyser, that has a very specific meaning in geology) are very, very marginal detections, potentially false detections, and subject to other interpretations. That only counts as returning data in the most minimal sense.
“2) Has two rovers actually on the surface of Mars, not just glossy art, plus routinely uses an orbiting communications and spy-satellite network there.”
At this point, it’s quite likely NASA only has one functional rover left on Mars. We’ll have to wait until the dust settles to be sure, and that might take a few more months. But Opportunity is definitely at risk.
Nor is it accurate to say we have a network of communications and spy-satellites orbiting Mars. We have three orbiters which can receive data from something on the surface at a wapping 1 Mbit per second (maximum) and only for the limited times when they are overflying the rover or whatever on the surface. They have no ability to communicate with each other (no orbiter-to-orbiter links) and the rate at which they transmit down to the surface is considerably lower. That’s not a “network.”
As far as surface imaging goes, HiRISE on MRO is the only spy-satellite level instrument, with a resolution of 0.3 meters. MAVEN’s only remote sensing instrument is a UV imaging spectrometer, designed to study the upper atmosphere. It can and has done some interesting observations of surface, but that’s not what it was designed for, and the best resolution is something like a kilometer (depending on altitude.) Mars Odyssey’s instruments are also not designed for high resolution imaging. The visible camera of the THEMIS instrument has 18 meter resolution, and the IR side has 100 meter resolution. So NASA’s got one spacecraft with one instrument which could be compared to a spy satellite, not a “network.”
I’m not saying those spacecraft haven’t accomplished great things, but let’s not exaggerate. They aren’t a network of communications and spy satellites.
“4) Is exploring Jupiter and just competed a detailed exploration of Saturn.”
This one really worries me, because Cassini’s exploration of Saturn was very incomplete. Fantastic, but incomplete. We discovered so many new things and didn’t have a chance (or the instrumentation) to follow up on everything. Similarly, Juno’s exploration of the jovian system will not be complete. That mission was deliberately focused on certain things (and, no matter how fantastic, the images are heavily processed to look cool, at the price of removing much of the scientific content.) When I read things like “completed… exploration” I worry that people actually think we’re done. That’s like saying Francis Drake explored America. He did, but just the Pacific coast and at that, he missed the San Francisco Bay.
It’s good, although I’d feel more confident in them planning big missions to Mars if Red Dragon (or some variant) was still going to happen in the near future.
Red Dragon was nixed and BFR accelerated. Teslarati.com reported talking to a SpaceXer at their Port of LA temporary facility – they’re fabbing tanks, domes and engineering articles, hoping to hit the ground running when the Phase 1 factory opens next year. The Phase 2 addition opens a year later.
Yes, and SpaceX is already looking for landing sites, which is probably the reason for the conference they are holding.
https://www.teslarati.com/s…
SpaceX is searching for BFR landing sites for early 2020s Mars missions.
It will be fun to see how NASA will justify the SLS/Orion once a BFR lands on Mars. It will be like trying to justify building transatlantic flying boats when the B707 entered service
I’m currently writing a novella portraying this very thing! 🙂
Sounds interesting, but sadly the Red Dragon is just another good idea NASA killed because it wasn’t invented there. The good news is it gave Elon Musk the motive needed to start building the BFR to replace it.
If NASA would let them practice propulsive landings at the end of Dragon 2 cargo missions, this might happen sooner rather than later. But NASA is being a bit penny wise but pound foolish here, IMHO.
NASA’s risk aversion is one of the biggest reasons we’re not seeing progress happen in a timely fashion. And in this case, the risk isn’t at all to astronauts, just returning cargo.
NASA killed the Red Dragon when their “safety”requirements forced SpaceX to land the Dragon2 in the ocean using parachutes. Elon Musk basically wrote it out of his plans after that which is why SpaceX is moving full speed ahead with the BFR with plans to send it to Mars without a crew within a few years. I suspect this conference is focused on determining how best to use the 150 tons it will be landing on the Mars surface. ?
Of course the Planetary Protection folks will have a fit and be doing there best to prevent it.
It’s not relevant to this workshop, but large payloads and planetary protection reminded me of something.
When you mentioned 150 tons of payload to the surface, I thought of the huge amount of surface area that represents. Assuming the first landing is unmanned and follows something like current planetary protection standards, that’s a problem. The idea of scrubbing every square centimeter of that much hardware is hard to imagine on a realistic budget.
However, at this year’s Interplanetary CubeSat workshop, on of the presenters (also the main organizer of the workshop) mentioned the role of 3D printing. He argued that the stock for a 3D printer is relatively easy to sterilize. At least compared to manufactured parts. So, for example, if you want lots of small meteorological stations, it might make planetary protection easier if you shipped a sterilized 3D printer (well, printers) and stock, and made the stations on site.
I’m also waiting for people to realize what tonnes of landed payload mean. Once people get their heads around the idea, the costs of highly optimized hardware, to get as much functionality per kilo, goes out the window. Probably optimization for low power as well, if you can spend mass to land more solar arrays. Possibly optimization for volume, although I’m not sure about that.
Yes, that is a lot of surface to sterilize. In terms of the payload to the surface you might think of it in terms of Curosity Rovers. If I recall it weights around a ton, so you could land about 150 on the surface with the BFR. Yep, an instant traffic jam at the landing site ?
Well, we don’t have 150 MMRTGs worth of plutonium 238 handy, so I don’t think the traffic jam will be that bad. I’m also not optimistic about BFR actually living up to the promises. But even if it’s a quarter of that (37.5 tonnes), it would produce all sorts of logistical issues. Traffic would be the least of my worries.
Unloading is an issue, before anything starts driving around.
Stationary instruments would have to worry about a pristine site. (Should they be moved 100 meters from the landing site before being set up? Or would it have to be 1000 m? If my met station is at the top of the BFR, is that ok, or is it still going to see dust tossed up by those rovers?)
Telecommunications would be a problem. We don’t have orbital assets to support this sort of thing. At 48 meters tall, line of sight transmutation to the top of a BFR (second stage, a.k.a. spacecraft) is 18 km. So relaying though the lander might not be sufficient. With a direct landing, that would not be solved by leaving communications satellites in orbit. Perhaps some supporting Falcon Heavy launches for that?
I’m inclined to say an initial mission using a BFR should be mass-inefficient. I’ve already mentioned how that would reduce payload costs. But it would also limit the payload. The logistics of supporting ten, MSL-class but oversized rovers might be enough as a first step. Supporting dozens of them would be like going from the old telephone system, with manual connections by operators, to modern IP packet routing. Doing it all in one step might not be a good idea.
Yes, it will require a real change in thinking and there is going to need to be some serious infrastructure planning needed. In essence it’s going from dog sleds to C-130’s in a single leap.
One of the first things needed will be the equipment to make a proper spaceport to reduce the dust. Then setting up equipment for making fuel and servicing the rockets along with the telecommunication infrastructure. Don’t forget placing a Comsat in the Mars L-5 so you have a relay when Mars is in conjection. And lots of solar panels and batteries for power. And maybe a mass produced rover based on Tesla technology that is self-driving as well. Big enough humans could hitch a ride on it if needed.
At this point, I’m not too comfortable talking about “the first things needed.” You list some things which will, or possibly will, be needed. I’d question the L5 relay; a couple weeks of communication gap during solar conjunction is normal for unmanned mission. That isn’t something which concerns me (especially once people are on site to handle unexpected things the computers aren’t programmed for.)
You are right about going from dog sleds to C-130, and that’s why I’m reluctant to say what the first things needed will be. In polar exploration, it took many, often unsuccessful, iteration to find out what landing an LC-130 on the ice really required. If you asked Nansen, in 1900, he wouldn’t have had a clue.
When it comes to Mars, we’re at the dog sled and ski stage. In polar exploration, the next question after dogs and skis was whether Siberian ponies or man hauling would be better (no, that’s stupid) or automobiles (not that one, but maybe with some changes, this one), to early aircraft landings (if you need JATO bottles for takeoff, you are in a world of hurt in terms of maintenance and safety) to reliable aircraft landings. In the case of Mars, figuring out what we need to do, and what things we need to do first, is probably going to take the same sort of field experience and trial and error.
Yes it will be an iterative process with a lot of learning from trial and error.The great thing about it is that SpaceX has the persistence and willingness to work that way, versus NASA which seems to have become so paralyzed through excessive planning that projects take years to accomplish. Folks seem to have forgot the Grasshopper trials that SpaceX did years ago that led to reusable rockets.
https://www.youtube.com/wat…
What to carry on the red planet is a part of the problem. And these collaborations will help SpaceX to tune specifics of their cargo rocket. But the main issue, whichever way you look at it, is and remains how to land ten or more tons at time. Nobody succeeded it so far. Nasa tried to improve their parachute technology with very limited progresses so they had to stop the program. Hypersonic retro-propulsion braking to land on Mars has to be experimented and proved there yet. Moreover one thing is to say there is frozen water under the soil of Mars, another is to dig, to extract, to separate from rocks and dust, and then make it usable to get oxigen for Sabatier process and produce methane for the rocket that will bring astronauts back. And this in sites interesting and not at poles. Again how many tons in once are needed to carry all these plant and machinery there? Who will assemble and test all these stuff before astronauts landing? I hope this meeting will start analyzing all these issues …
Some sorts of in situ resource production could be tested immediately. Using atmospheric CO2 and imported hydrogen to make methane/oxygen fuel and oxygen for life support, for example. That just requires pumping in atmospheric gas, and the process is the same if the imported hydrogen is replaced with hydrogen from in istu water ice.
Use of in situ water ice has been studied for decades, and we may be about as far as we can go without work on Mars. As you point out, there are many uncertainty about the concentration of ice, at what depth, how to dig it up, separate it from the regolith, etc. I don’t see how we can learn about those things without going to Mars. I think a likely first mission would only be able to dig or drill, measure the ice abundance (an how the ice and regolith are mixed) and assay the site. Well, ideally, multiple sites near the landing site. How far apart those sites should be (10 meters or 10 kilometers) is something we can probably guess at today, and that would guide the payload plans for the initial landing.
Lots of disgruntled people inside NASA right now. Its akin to the quickening. People are walking into work realizing all their work, some of whom have loyal served for decades, is about to obsolete.
First they ignore you.
Then they laugh at you.
Then they attack you.
Then you win.
Not around here. What NASA are you talking about?
My comment wasn’t about what SpaceX has, could or might do. My comment was about an exaggerated description of what NASA has done. My point was that, if you want to say NASA has done great things in terms of scientific exploration, that’s fine. But there is no need to exaggerate, and doing so just weakens that argument. Simply sticking to the facts (e.g. a single spy satellite quality telescope orbiting Mars rather than a network of them) is extremely impressive. Achievements like that stand on their own, unvarnished merits.
And, in my opinion, exaggerating is harmful. It gives the impression we have already done things we haven’t. When someone tries to actually do those things, people will wonder what’s new and why we’re trying to do something we’ve already done.
Look, I respect that NASA Watch has a valuable role to play as a watchdog of a taxpayer funded agency, but the constant “down-with-NASA” negativity in these comments, particularly when the topic of Space-X comes up, is harmful. So is pedantry when wielded as a weapon against NASA.
I’ll accept that, depending on what resolution you want to consider, there could be a single NASA “spy satellite” at Mars. But we absolutely do have a communication network there. Look up the definitions of “communication” and “network”. I can’t help that you are dismissive of the challenges to get that 1 Mbps returned to Earth, or that it just isn’t comprehensive enough to suit you..
And more negativity – you actually complained that I should have declared Opportunity dead already. It has radio-isotope heaters and a relatively warm environment with the dusty skies, and has handled extended power outages before.
So you don’t like that I stated that we flew a spacecraft through the plume (of Enceladus) and sampled it. To target a narrow jet at a range of millions of kilometers – the timing and navigation of all those bodies, the incredible DSN communication, the instrumentation needed, the testing and human coordination is just jaw dropping. All you can do is complain that, sniff, you didn’t think much of the science.
Further, you complain about the statement the Cassini has completed a detailed exploration of Saturn. Eleven functioning instruments in orbit for more than a decade, 150+ fly-bys, over 3,800 papers published – doesn’t register with you as “detailed”? Cassini has, as I correctly stated, just completed a detailed exploration of Saturn.
Sorry for unloading, but it is just annoying when people who should be pulling together to further exploration, and, yes, NASA, only sit around and grumble.
I don’t believe I wrote any “down with NASA” comments (in this discussion, at least.) But I disagree with you about “pedantry when wielded as a weapon against NASA”, since I’m not using anything as a weapon. We are taking about scientific exploration, and science is about facts. Exaggerating and distorting those accomplishments doesn’t promote NASA and scientific exploration; I think it actively harms them. For example:
“Look up the definitions of “communication” and “network”” I’m familiar with the definitions, but just to be sure, I did look it up. All the definitions I can find imply a system of multiple, interconnected nodes. In communications, it specifically means one where messages can be routed through multiple paths from the sender to the recipient. I’d like to have that at Mars. A Curiosity to Mars Odyssey to MAVEN to Earth path would be quite useful; it would put fewer constraints on science my Mare Odyssey and MAVEN. But we don’t have that capability.
By claiming we do, you’re making it harder to establish a Mars communications network. When people don’t want to fund it, saying, “what’s wrong with the network we already have?” how would you answer them?
Nor did I criticize the Cassini measurements of the Enceladus plume. I was talking about the alleged discovery of plumes on Europa.
In terms of Cassini, you are both giving the mission too little and too much credit. Navigation was far better than you suggest: The Enceladus plume is actually a large target. I’d have to look up the statistics, but I think every targeted encounter was on target to within 100 meters or so. I personally stopped keeping track, since my own work wasn’t sensitive to errors of under a kilometer. The telecommunications and DSN support were fantastic. In fact, scaled for distance, far better than the 1 Mbps relay from the Mars orbiters (1 Mbits at about 0.5 AU, the closest for Mars, would be 1.25 kbps from Saturn; we downlinking at well over 15 kbps, well over 50 kbps to a 70-m station.)
At the same time, those DSN antennas are getting old, and the current plans are to add some 34-m stations (great) and just use the existing 70-m stations until they die of old age (no life-extending maintenance; not so great.) And those 34-m stations aren’t quite as good as the older ones (they were designed for low cost maintenance and upgradability, not efficiency, but somehow the funding for upgrades never appeared.) There were plans for much more extensive upgrades, but that was also never funded. And part of the problem is people making relentlessly upbeat statements about the DSN. No one funds maintenance or upgrades for infrastructure when they constantly hear only good things about the existing infrastructure.
As far as Cassini itself, I think every scientist involved (myself included) has a long, long list of things we _didn’t_ learn. Mine starts with the length of a day on Saturn. (Still uncertain to the few percent level; we knew the Earth’s rotation rate to 30 parts per billion in 1582.)
The Enceladus plume crossings were very fast, 10-20 seconds in the dense plume and there were lots of structures we crossed in only a second or two. The in situ instruments weren’t designed for anything like that. The one I worked with had 2 to 4 second resolution (depending on the sensor) for partial data and a few minutes for a full measurement. The magnetometer was the only instrument that got full data at better than 1 second resolution.
It would also be nice to know the composition of Titan’s ionosphere. We have good mass spectra for positive ions below 100 AMU, but we discovered incredibly complex ion chemistry (probably the precursors to haze particles), with both positive and negative ions, with masses going well over 1000 AMU. That was based on data from sensors which weren’t really designed to be a mass spectrometer, but could function as a low resolution one under the circumstances (at +-10% uncertainty for the negative ions.)
And that’s just the first three things on my personal list. All that’s not a criticism of the mission or the instruments. They were designed and built based on our best knowledge of the Saturn system in 1990. But we discovered new and unexpected things, and things which had never even been suggested when the instruments were built.
That’s why I get upset when people say we have (past tense) explored the Saturn system. It is a matter of “people who should be pulling together to further exploration” but it isn’t me “sit[ting] around and grumbl[ing].” Talking about all the great things Cassini did, without mentioning all the things it didn’t do, just promotes a “been there, done that” attitude which is poisonous to further exploration. So, I guess I’m pretty emphatic about not letting people exaggerate those accomplishments.
Elon Musk’s motivation is simple to understand to any nerd – he is a nerd kid that dreamed of going to Mars and that is exactly what he is doing now. And he plans on having fun along the way, such as launching his Tesla into space. The problem with NASA is that folks there have become way to serious about what they are doing and are forgetting to have fun doing it.