A space agency is looking for volunteers for a manned mission to mars, with the intention of research, mining, and manufacturing making use of the unique martian resources. Before you answer, consider these points:
- The launch is two years away from now, or if you are less than 20, your 20th birthday. You must be 20 or above to apply.
- At all points, only equipment that could be bought or built today will be used.
- Volunteering requires a $500 screening fee (non-refundable).
- There will be a physical and psychological examination of all volunteers over the next three months. This will be to screen out the dangerously unhealthy personnel; morbid obesity, infectious disease, suicidal behavior, homicidal behavior... This will only screen out the most fatal flaws.
- Following the screening, you will be charged a several-thousand dollar training fee that may be mitigated, waived, or delayed if you show promise or have unique skills. Most volunteers will not be in the first mission even if accepted; they will be a part of the second or third mission.
- If accepted, you will be taken to a training facility (they are globally positioned; two in North America, three in Europe, one in Japan (also serves Australia and Oceania), three in mainland Asia, one in South America) where you will be given grueling physical and metal training.
- The first three months of this are somewhat similar to boot camp or basic training, with the addition of training on the general equipment you will be using; environment suits, basic living quarters equipment, and so on. Though the work is hard, you may spend your limited free time off-base.
- After basic training is complete, all volunteers that pass a second round of examinations will graduate to specialist training; although expert positions (space piloting for instance) are already filled with professional astronauts, unskilled, semi-skilled, and entry-level positions are available. Such positions as maintenance, basic manufacturing work much like a blue-collar job on earth, or possibly something as exotic as surface vehicle piloting or orbital operations/maintenance, the two jobs most likely to get you outside of the base or ship. Finally, there will be "technician" positions that basically put you at the beck and call of professionals as assistants to engineers, scientists, and administrative staff, and in nursing, security, and low-level engineering and construction tasks.
- Your specialty will be chosen considering your own preference, your previous experience, your aptitudes in basic training, and to a significant degree, the needs of the mission. There is a significant probability your first choice is not available; there are only three space jiggalos budgeted.
- Specialist training continues for 16-17 months and is split with further orbital, flight, and martian surface training. It is spent in partial quarantine to decrease the spread of disease. During this time, some specialties will be sent to different training centers; IT techs for instance might all study at the Huston training center, while mining techs are at the Chile facility. There is little free time and contact with non-mission people will be limited.
- The final two months are spent in launch and flight practice in simulators, putting training on hold. At this point, your basic training is mostly complete, and you start receiving a salary for your position. It is somewhat higher than the salary for similar, earthbound work.
- Starting at the launch day, personnel will be shuttled to the martian transit vessel, volunteers first. This takes several days to launch all personnel.
- The trip to Mars is aboard a single, large, ugly and streamlined vessel similar in appearance to the ISS with engines.
- The trip takes six months, during which time your training continues. The life-support ready areas of the vessel will be very cramped. There will most likely be one murder, two accidental deaths, and the estimated likelihood of cataclysmic failure during flight is 0.05%.
- On arrival, the crew will be ferried down and the first temporary shelters erected. A portion of the crew remains on the ship to maintain it. Work begins immediately to construct a permanent facility there, start research, and prepare materials to ship back to earth- possibly H3, possibly other materials.
- Personnel and goods start being shipped back after 18 months; mission 2 personnel arrive six months after that. Some volunteers will be promoted to positions previously held by professional astronauts. Every two years, the previous mission heads home while the new one heads out.
So then; With all that, what do you think? Would you volunteer?
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