Explorers need maps. We have some good aerial photographs of the region around Flashline Station, but an aerial photograph is not a map. A map requires mathematical organization, which is imparted to it by a system of coordinates.
July 20th, 2001
Dispatch from Mars Society Arctic Expedition – Robert Zubrin – July 20, 2001
Today was the 25th anniversary of humanity’s first successful attempt to land a robotic probe on Mars. On this day in 1976, the Viking 1 spacecraft set down on Chryse Planitia. It was also the anniversary of another occasion. On this day in 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed their Apollo 11 spacecraft on the Moon.
July 19th, 2001
Dispatch from Mars Society Arctic Expedition – Robert Zubrin – July 19, 2001
This morning I outlined the plan of campaign for the third crew. Unlike all the other rotations, this crew has no one in it with extensive Devon Island field exploration experience. For us, as for a crew newly landed on Mars, the surrounding territory is terra incognita. We have aerial photographs and a topographic map, but they do not tell us what the land about us is really like, or what we can find there. So we must create a map with sensuous content. We must explore.
July 18th, 2001
Dispatch from Mars Society Arctic Expedition – Robert Zubrin – July 18, 2001
The new crew awoke bright and early, and after breakfast and a short briefing, began to suit up for their first EVA. Because it would be their first sortie, I kept the plan conservative. Three crew members would do a two-hour pedestrian excursion on Hayes Ridge, to continue the general geological and paleontological survey of the area begun by Vladimir, Katy, and I in our first EVA a week ago. The EVA crew, consisting of Charles Frankel, Cathrine Frandsen, and Christine Jayarajah, would be led by Charles with Brent Bos serving as their capcom in the station.
July 17th, 2001
Dispatch from Mars Society Arctic Expedition – Robert Zubrin – July 17, 2001
After yesterday’s brutal EVA, I decided to set an easier schedule for today. We spent the morning filling out psychological questionnaires and rejuvenating equipment that had been negatively impacted by our recent battle with the mud. Only after lunch would we attempt an EVA, whose mission would be to complete Vladimir’s geophone survey of Haynes Ridge.
July 16th, 2001
Miles goes to Mars — on Earth
We are headed about 450 miles above the Arctic Circle to Devon Island, in the Canadian province of Nunavut. It is the world’s largest uninhabited island and is certainly a semi-finalist in the contest for “most bleak.” Postcards from this muddy rock pile would look a lot like Pathfinder images (just add sepia) and, as it turns out, the similarities to Mars run more than rock deep. It is cold, dry and seemingly lifeless — about as close to the fourth rock from the sun as you’ll find on the third. There are actually two camps sharing the putty-colored tundra. On the edge of a huge asteroid impact crater sits a mock spaceship that serves as home base for the Mars Analog Research Station (MARS). Staged by the Mars Society, the project focuses on how future martian explorers might live and work in such harsh surroundings. For example, before crew members leave the “ship”, they don bulky spacesuits.
July 16th, 2001
Mars Society Special Bulletin #46
In this Issue *** Mars Society Mission Simulation Begins in the High Arctic *** Mars Desert Research Station Exhibit Opens at Kennedy Space Center *** Mars Society Convention News *** Mars Society Political Work Expands *** Ares 3 CD Issued
July 16th, 2001
Dispatch from Mars Society Arctic Expedition – Robert Zubrin – July 16, 2001
We took some time off last night to watch another movie. This time the selection was the goofy alien invasion spoof “Mars Attacks.” The crew got a real kick out of it. In fact, they got so high on the film that this morning, when the EVA team did their radio voice checks, everyone substituted Martian talk “Ack, Ack Ack, Ack Ack Ack,” for the usual integer count to ten.
July 15th, 2001
Dispatch from Mars Society Arctic Expedition – Robert Zubrin – July 15, 2001
The weather today was fair, with the prospect for better tomorrow and Tuesday. So we decided to seize the time to perform a reconnaissance EVA to try to find the best site for Vladimir’s geophone flute seismic sounding experiment. The crew was Vladimir, Katy, and I, and our target area to survey was the Von Braun Planitia, a large flat expanse stretching north from the hills overlooking the Lowell Canal.
July 14th, 2001
Dispatch from Mars Society Arctic Expedition – Robert Zubrin – July 14, 2001
Last night we finally were able to get everyone to stop working at the same time and have some group R&R watching a DVD projector image of the movie “The Vertical Limit.” If you’ve seen this movie you know that the scenery and cinematography are incredible, but the action is ridiculously contrived, with the climbers making one absurd mistake after another in order to maintain the momentum of the film as an avalanche of literal cliffhangers. It had us all in stitches.