Essay, Research Paper: Popka

One question that is being asked by people is, "Why go to Mars"? The reasons are very simple. People want to gain recognition of how they were the first people who went to Mars and opened up a whole new world and most importantly to move forward in economics. As humans waste the precious materials and resources found on this planet we have to consider going to other planets to explore for materials and energy resources. Mars would be the first area for industrial development and mining in the "new world". There are talks that by the end of this century that a manned mission to Mars should take place. We must start preparing ourselves properly in order to explore Mars better. Scientists and researchers hopes when exploring Mars is to find interesting minerals or matter that will help usunderstand what Mars was like millions and millions of years ago. The first manned mission to Mars will be more complex then that of the first Moon landing which the main goal for going to the Moon was to just land safely. The main thing that researchers and scientists are striving for is exploratory, searching for useful raw materials such as water and at the same time building up an extensive scientific picture of Mars its stateat the present moment, its history and what the future developments are going to be. As astronauts journey to Mars and finally reach there the main concern and top priority when landing will be the astronauts safety. There will be more flexibility when choosing a landing site. The astronauts will decide where they want to land but must take into consideration that the roving vehicles would be able to provide extended range when travelling on the surface of Mars. This most probably would ensure that the sites that are in the scientists interest would easily be accessible.
Possible landing sites must be chosen under one goal, that would be the overall understanding of the surface and not by a place that looks attractive or has special features even if they seem alluring. The things that have to be taken in account for possible landing sites are: - guaranteeing that the explorers will touch down at the place which is specified;- choosing a place where possible interesting geological features may be found;- choosing an area where rocks have recently been exposed;- a certain area must be specified of where the roving vehicles may go. Regions on Mars that have extensive dune fields and barely any bedrock, the surface mobilities should be within a few kilometers to guarantee that samples can be obtained without any difficulty. Landing sites that have easy access to more than one type of interesting terrainhas an advantage but unfortunately these sites lean to be more on the rough side and might pose to be a weighty hazard and obstacles might be in the way of roving vehicles. There are a possible of ten prime landing sites that might be chosen when a manned mission to Mars has taken place. The Kasei and Mangala valles are made up of striking features which seem to have channels that are evidently engraved by flowing water from the past. Extensive studies would provide significant clues to why Mars lost reserves of water. These locations would offer and give explorers a big advantage as this area is close to the large volcanoes and volcanic plains that are near the equator, which will have affected their geology a tremendous deal. There are other riveting sites other than these, but they are difficult to reach for a manned mission to Mars. The Polar region sites