Red Dragon Options

[Paolo]

'Red Dragon' Mission Mulled as Cheap Search for Mars Life
any opinion on this? would it really make sense adapting a manned spaceship to unmanned Mars landing? I am skeptical...

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[tanjent]

This is an issue that has arisen recently in Schiaparelli's case, and I am still not quite comfortable with the idea of going to the trouble of making landings without a science payload. Clearly, almost any instrument package would weigh significantly more than no instruments at all, and leaving the instruments out would reduce fuel consumption and risks associated with atmospheric entry. But the landing technology to be tested is focused on heavier classes of payloads anyway - we already know that air bags work pretty well for the smaller packages.

The risks of missing a launch window if instrument development falls behind schedule don't seem so serious if instruments tested on earlier missions can be re-used. Even on battery power, photography and remote sensing can probably characterize the immediate vicinity of the landing site in three days just as well as the Viking landers were able to characterize theirs in three years with the help of nuclear power. It wouldn't exactly be new knowledge, but we only possess that kind of data for half a dozen locations on the planet - why not take the opportunity to add a couple more?