- LONDON (Sapa-AP) -- European
scientists set out a map on Tuesday for manned missions to Mars that aims
to land astronauts on the Red Planet in less than 30 years.
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- Like American President George Bush's proposed mission
to Mars, the plan put forward by the European Space Agency involves a "stepping
stone" approach, which includes robotic missions and a manned trip
to the Moon first.
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- "We need to go back to the Moon before we go to
Mars. We need to walk before we run," said Dr Franco Ongaro, who heads
the ESA's Aurora programme for long-term exploration of the solar system,
at a meeting of Aurora scientists in London. "These are our stones.
They will pave the way for our human explorers."
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- The ESA has planned two flagship missions to Mars - ExoMars
would land a rover on the planet in 2009, and Mars Sample Return would
bring back a sample of the Martian surface from 2011 to 2014.
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- Other test missions will include a non-manned version
of the flight that would eventually carry astronauts to Mars to demonstrate
aerobraking, solar electric propulsion and soft landing technologies.
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- A human mission to the Moon, proposed for 2024, would
demonstrate key life-support and habitation technologies, as well as aspects
of crew performance and adaptation to long-distance space flight.
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- The program is expected to cost about Euro900-million
(about $1.13-billion) over the next five years.
-
- Professor Colin Pillinger, the British scientist behind
the recent ill-fated Beagle 2 expedition, said it was important to determine
whether life existed on Mars before pressing ahead with a manned mission.
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- "Would it be right for us to tamper with the ecology
on another body?" he asked. "My opinion is that it probably wouldn't."
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- The ExoMars rover would use solar arrays to generate
electricity and travel several kilometres across the surface of Mars.
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- It would have on-board software enabling it to operate
autonomously, and, like Beagle 2, a set of scientific instruments designed
to search for signs of past or present life.
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- Mars Sample Return would be a more complex mission requiring
five spacecraft - an interplanetary transfer stage, a Mars orbiter, a descent
module, an ascent module and an Earth re-entry vehicle.
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- The module would contain a drill to collect soil samples
and was expected to send back around half a kilogram of Martian soil.
-
- Scientists hope the expedition has a better outcome than
the Beagle 2 trip. The British-built lander, which was due to land on Mars
on Christmas Day, has not been heard from since it separated from the ESA's
mother ship, Mars Express, in mid-December, despite several efforts to
contact it.
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- Mars Express itself has functioned as intended, orbiting
the planet. ESA scientists said last month that it had found the most direct
evidence yet of water in the form of ice on Mars, detecting molecules vaporising
from the Red Planet's south pole.
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- By contrast, Nasa's twin rovers are reaching out to scoop
and analyse the Martian surface about 10 560km apart, both machines using
their robotic arms as intended following a software glitch.
-
- Bush last month sought to chart a new course for Nasa,
focusing on a return to the Moon by 2020 in preparation for manned missions
to Mars and beyond.
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