Many of the 1960's Mars Flyby plans were built around just that concept, an unmanned lander would collect rock/atmosphere samples which would then be analyzed by the astronauts on the return portion of the flight.

On the subject of studying the history of the Martian climate the Altair VI blog ran an article on a proposal to bring a sample of the South Pole icecap back to Earth for study (See: Here).

I'm not sure you're taking into account the cost of the latest rover mission. Either that, or you have much larger estimates for MSR than I have seen.

In any case, I am not proposing that we drop all in situ missions and do MSR exclusively. The downside of MSR's is that you invest a great deal of resources in a very small number of sites on Mars. We need to continue the in situ missions in order to cover more sites on Mars, and help us better decide which of those sites are worthy of the MSR investments.

Folk here are wondering why we should even be talking about MSR, since there's obviously no way we'll ever be able to afford it, or if we can afford it, it would hijack the entire program at great risk with the potential of no return (so to speak).

I am not assuming no risk. I am assuming that there will be more than one MSR. If parts of the first attempt fail, then we learn and try again. That is the nature of this business. It is not for the faint of heart.

I am thinking on the 100-year time scale, considering what is the most effective way to explore Mars. In my mind, several sample returns from Mars, say on the order of ten, would be much, much more efficient than a pure orbital and in situ program. There are likely questions we wouldn't be able to answer definitively at all with only a century of in situ work. The life question comes to mind.

As for affordability, MSR can be spread out over multiple opportunities, and could and must coexist with other mission types for the reasons mentioned above. MSR objectives can be split into sampling, ascent, and return missions (requiring both a surface and an orbital rendezvous). That kind of split also has the benefit of spreading the risk, and allowing for more flexible program planning for the introduction of other missions as well as in situ and orbital objectives added to those MSR components.

Some argue that we do not yet know enough to decide where to send MSR. If we thought that there would only be one MSR, ever, for all eternity, then I'd agree. However many science groups have discussed this issue, and we certainly know several places today to send the first MSR, for which those samples would increase our knowledge of Mars manyfold. The results would further instruct the planning for future orbiter, in situ, and sample return missions.

I won't try to do the $ calculations here (since that's fraught with peril, and no one agrees on the numbers anyway). However I think that to first order, a scientifically-rich combined orbital, in-situ, sample return Mars program with about one sample returned per decade could be maintained for on the order of (fy08) $800M a year. Not all of that has to come from the US, and probably wouldn't.

The question of whether such a program would remain sufficiently important in the minds of world policy makers to justify that investment, I have no idea. But that's their job, not mine.

At the risk of catching a lot of arrows, I think HDP Don made an excellent point that argues against MSR: What should we spend 5 or 6 billion dollars on to return?

Mars is increasingly appearing far more diverse than originally thought when MSR was first conceived. How in the world do you prioritize potential targets? I can't see any single site capable of satisfying the needs of all stakeholders (and there are a whole bunch), which implies requirement creep, possibly to the point of extinction. It'll be a project manager's nightmare.

A manned mission, on the other hand, has to meet one overriding contraint: the site has to be safe for the crew to ingress & egress. This would tend to cut down on community infighting. Moreover, as others have pointed out, the quantity of samples returned would be MUCH larger then MSR could provide, and with any luck also offer some regional diversity (as we saw at Gusev; Home Plate is surrounded by locally typical terrain, and it was a relatively small traverse from the landing site.)

Unless there's a really cheap & much less risky way to do it, I just don't see what MSR can offer for its price beyond the long shot of finding a living native Martian organism. No current concept can provide anything like a representative area survey in terms of tangible payload return, and frankly the MERs have shown that in situ remote sensing is much more effective in this regard.

$800 million/year over 10 years == $8 billion

Over a 10 year period there are approvimately 5 Mars launch opportunities. If we assume one mission per opportunity, that means that of that $8 billion you'd be spending $1.6 billion per opportunity. Given that an MSR requires 2 launch opportunities that would roughly give it $3 billion over that 10 years.

Which on the face of it is not bad. The trouble is can an MSR be done for $3 billion, especially the first one?

I dunno, but if you want a comparison here is what Cassini cost (taken from this page).

What does the Cassini-Huygens mission cost?

The total cost of the Cassini-Huygens mission is about $3.26 billion, including $1.4 billion for pre-launch development, $704 million for mission operations, $54 million for tracking and $422 million for the launch vehicle. The U.S. contributed $ 2.6 billion, the European Space Agency $500 million and the Italian Space Agency $160 million.

These figures are from the press kit, "The Jupiter Millennium Mission," which was prepared in October 2000. You can see it at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits.cfm, where you can also find the press kit that was prepared for the launch in 1997.

Personally, I cannot see an MSR mission costing less than Cassini, especially given that the MSR will involve at least:

* two Earth launch vehiclee
* two landers (or, more likely, one Mars lander and one Earth recovery capsule). Note that this assumes the rover and the Martian launch vehicle arrive on Mars in the same lander. If they don't (or can't) then an extra lander will be needed.
* one rover
* one Martian launch vehicle
* one in situ fueling apparatus for the Martian launch vehicle (if said vehicle does not come pre-fuelled; this can be dispensed with if it does, although the pre-fueled sort would, of course, increase the size and weight of the Martian launch vehicle as flown from Earth)
* two (or maybe three) cruise stages (two for the flights to Mars and maybe a separate one to send the samples et al back to Earth unless the second Mars one is reused)
* an Earth entry vehicle (although this may be incorporated into the Earth lander)
* Optional extra for first launch: an orbiting telecommunications relay for rover & Martian launch vehicle ground operations

For those who have hopes of international partners defraying part--and presumably a substantial part--of the cost I notice that in Cassini's case American taxpayers are paying for nearly 80% of the mission. If that were so for that $800 million/year Mars program that would mean the US would still need to fork out about $640 million a year.

(Of course, if the international partners aren't involved in the entire program only in particular missions, or parts if particular missions then there may be some years where the US has to fork out the entirety of that $800 million.)

BTW, note that $1.422 billion + $710 million + $54 million + $422 million + $500 million + $160 million == $3.27 billion

That is, most of the upfront cost and ongoing operational costs were (and are) apparently being borne by NASA.
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Stephen

With all due respect, that may be exactly what will happen.

How many (unmanned) Lunar Sample Return missions has America ever launched? Once the Apollo program was lofted into political orbit courtesy of JFK there was no need to send any. The manned missions were expected to handle the sample returning part.

That particular precedent suggests that the window of opportunity for NASA MSRs will only last until manned missions to Mars find their way onto NASA's launching schedules (as opposed to the mere vague promise we have at the moment of having some manned missions to the Red Planet at some unspecified point down the track).

Moreover the window will probably close some years before the first manned mission is actually sent because those will be the years NASA will be wanting to give priority to sending unmanned missions which will support the manned ones. Sample returns will probably find themselves at the end of the queue unless they can be justified in a manned context. (Eg sending rovers on several years ahead to collect samples for the astronauts to retrieve. But that isn't quite the same thing as a fully unmanned MSR.)

For example, if NASA sends its first manned missions in the mid to late 2030s then even at a rate of one MSR per decade it's unlikely there will be more than 1 MSR because at some point in the mid to late 2020s, or early 2030s at the latest, the "window" will close as NASA begins ramping itself up for the manned missions. If the first goes by 2018 then by hurrying the second you might squeeze in two, especially if parts of the first (eg the rover) could be reused and/or if parts of the MSR (eg vehicle frames, Martian launch vehicles) could be standardised so that the proverbial wheel did not have to be reinvented for each mission, and also reducing the lead time. But sending the MSRs to the same part of Mars simply to cut costs and get a second in may not go down well.

And of course that is all assuming the first part of the the first MSR leaves in 2018. The longer the first gets delayed the less likely there will be many more. Or even any more.

Then there's the growing competition for a slice of the NASA funding pie from other high-priced unmanned missions in the decades to come, especially into the outer solar system. NASA is slowly accumulating a growing number of increasingly expensive committments--or at least expectations for--flagship missions to places like Titan and Europa. It seems fair to say that at least two contenders are already an inevitability: a Europan orbiter and a Titan/Enceladus mission; and one can foresee at least two more in the years beyond 2030: a mission to probe below the ice of Europa into its putative ocean (most seem to be expecting an Europan orbiter will confirm such an ocean) and a Neptune orbiter;and maybe a Titan rover/balloon also if the next Saturnian mission isn't such a one. Already NASA is having to pare back Mars funding to pay for its next outer planets flagship mission (which in turn may force the MSR to steal funds from other Mars missions like the AFL).

Unless NASA's overall funding improves that sort of thing is only likely to grow worse. What will probably happen is that some missions will get pushed back to pay for others. The problem MSR missions face is that if they get pushed back far enough sooner or later they will collide with any American manned program to Mars which does eventuate.

My own guesstimate is that if the first MSR does start in 2018, then the next is not likely until around the mid to late 2030s, with maybe a third some time in the early to mid 2050s. That is, 15-20 years between MSRs. Under that scenario, however, to have a second would require the manned missions be pushed back to the 2050s while a third MSR would only occur if manned missions were pushed all the way back to the 2060s or later, which frankly would be a tragedy. (In fact if it did happen one can almost predict the likely landing date of the first mission now: July 20, 2069!)
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Stephen

Much as I love robots, that is too depressing.

Will they take 106-year olds?

Andy

As I mentioned in my post, I was considering using three opportunities for one MSR, not two. Rover, ascent, and return orbiter. In a decade you get that plus 1.6 more quite well-funded (i.e. not Scout) non-MSR missions and the option of additional payloads on the MSR elements. Doing the arithmetic correctly (26 months per opportunity) results in about $5.2B per MSR.

That's not quite right, since there are other program costs besides the missions, but to first order we're talking around $5B per spread-out MSR, not $3B. There are more cost-efficient ways to do MSR when profile is not an issue, but profile is always an issue.

announcement for the date for their Mars SAR Mission -- 2018

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7500371.stm

cheers

full inline quote removed - Admin

Nice to see that the powers that be are still pushing for MSR to happen. However the conceptual video depicts a mere "grab-and-go" mission that the Mars science community is violently opposed to (versus careful sample selection). Perhaps worse (and my own pet peeve), the Mars ascent vehicle is depicted as 2 stages built according to satellite-type propulsion methodology. When is the Mars community as a whole going to appreciate that the necessary miniature launch vehicle needs about a decade of aggressive new rocket technology development. Let's see, 2018 minus a decade is today, but (for example) NASA's Mars Technology Program this year is barely breathing.

Yes I know it's just a marketing video but it reinforces the ingrained prejudice that all planetary missions can be done using satellite parts!
John W.

That ESA animation has been doing the rounds for years - I would read exactly nothing into it, especially when Europe is far more likely to build the return-leg orbiting component.

Doug

My favourite nonsense SAR image is this (lifted from nasa site)


there is so much wrong with this artwork.

1) where is the descent stage? (MSL??)
2) the ramp goes to where?? on the corresponding point on the ascent stage
3) check out the 'arm' on the launch pad
4) the mid 90's version of Sojourner hanging around on a cliff
5) 'another rover' on the far hillside (where is that descent stage?)
6) zero aerodynamic considerations on the ascent stage (this thing still has to punch a fast hole in the thin atmosphere)

Doug, you should hold a Mars Sar artwork contest on the site and give the winners to NASA!

cheers

I missed that one. Note to self: Mars has an atmosphere.

And what taketh away, giveth. It's hard enough to slow down during EDL.

I was also surprised by that 2018 date, but the more I thought about it the more it made sense.

History suggests that whatever date you propose for a mission like this almost inevitably slides, for both technical and political reasons.

So, why propse a more technically reasonable date like 2020, or 2022, if it is only going to get slipped by the political process into 2024?

Seems like a reasonable gambit to propose 2018, and then have to suffer a slip into 2020 or 2022, which is the soonest you can be ready anyway.

Hi again,
Re the past couple days of comments above, OK fair enough to not read anything into artist conceptions, and fair enough to set a date that may later slip.

The source document underlying the July 10 news item is available from the Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group at http://mepag.jpl.nasa.gov. Click MEPAG Analysis Reports, then scroll all the way down to the bottom, to download the Preliminary Planning for an International Mars Sample Return Mission, Report of the iMARS (International Mars Architecture for the Return of Samples) Working Group. This document has 31 authors (the Working Group) and is dated 2008Jun1.

The Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV) is listed as the second item in the table on page 21 (p. 25 of the pdf). The third column, "Technology Development Needed," lists 3 items for the MAV as follows.
1. Propellant and materials for long-duration storage and performance in Mars environment.
2. Launch from low-mass landed platform.
3. Low-mass avionics.

"Propellant and materials" development? Strangely, no mention of the need to create and design and build a miniature launch vehicle!

The only place in the text I could find mention of the MAV is on page 29 (p 33 of the pdf) which merely says there needs to be a MAV. Other items for the mission are discussed in more detail.

The very next page shows a schedule for technology development (Figure 5). Major headings are Orbiter Technology, Lander Technology, and SRF Technology (Sample Receiving Facility in Texas). The MAV should logically be one of the major headings, but it is lumped in as a mere item within Lander Technology.

Based on the iMARS report, I again submit that the MAV challenge is way underestimated. There simply is no community of people who have experience building miniature launch vehicles, which is consistent with a lack of lobbying for recognition and funding of the MAV problem.

John W.

I believe somebody mentioned the idea of having another look at the mid-80s US ASAT missile, which was launched from an F-15; might be a good idea as a starting point.

Only as a starting point, though, and probably only as a case study in compact solid booster design. I agree with you, John; this is a formidable problem that had better not be underestimated. The ASAT payload certainly wasn't designed to do anything but find & hit a target, and a MAV needs to be a whole hell of a lot smarter & adaptive for this stunt to have a prayer of working.