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Aviation History
1999
1999 - 0432.PDF
SPACEFLIGHT Martian gliders NASA hopes to deploy a fleet of small gliders to explore parts of Mars that other spacecraft cannot reach TIM FURNISS/LONDON SWOOPING THROUGH Mars' own grand canyon, the Valles Marineris, would be the ultimate hang-gliding trip. The first aircraft to make that tantalising journey could be the $40 million Mars Airplane, which NASA hopes to launch in 2003. The aircraft is part of the new Micromission programme being developed by NASA to enable multi ple small payloads to be carried piggy back on larger planetary spacecraft. The Mars Airplane is intended to demonstrate technologies to enable the maximum amount of Mars data to be returned to earth, according to NASA's Office of Space Science. "We intend to select the scientific investiga tions and probably the entire aero- plane/payload/entry system through competitive peer review," says NASA. A wide range of scientific missions could be flown on the aircraft, from high-resolution imaging to monitoring Martian weather. Although the exact specifications of the Mars aircraft have yet to be determined through com petitive bids, the basic guidelines call for a craft with a 2m (6ft) wingspan and a maximum weight of 20kg (451b). The mission could involve either three unpowered, microlight- class, vehicles or a single glider powered by a small hydrazine motor. NASA says the Mars Airplane will be "analo gous" to the Mars Pathfinder which, with its Sojourner rover, landed on the Red Planet in July 1997. The Pathfinder kicked offa series of Mars flights that may culminate in Martian samples being returned to earth in 2005. NASA is putting forward a $9 million fund ing request for the Mars Airplane project in its fiscal year 2 000 budget proposal. The organisa tion hopes the aircraft will be launched in 2003. Ideally, the rest of the $40 million price tag would be funded incrementally in fiscal years 2001 and 2002. If funding is delayed, the first mission could be pushed back to 2 005. If a three-glider project is adopted, the air craft would be deployed from a main lander craft at 12 km, and would fly 120km during 20min flights, propelled by the high Martian A glider concept seen over Mars' Valles Marineris winds and updraughts. The powered glider concept would involve a craft deployed at 15km, using a parafoil. It would then deploy its wings and propeller to fly a 7 50km circuit at 600km/h. POTENTIAL MISSIONS The Mars Airplane's potential missions could be tailored for large-scale or detailed explo rations. It could provide regional coverage at moderate resolution, filling the gap between die wide coverage of orbiters and the small area - but high resolution - coverage of landers. Alternatively, it could provide regional imag ing and high-resolution spectral data and enable geophysical investigations to probe the sub surface of a large region. Valuable measure ments of atmospheric conditions over a wide altitude range could also be provided, as well as a close scrutiny of potential future landingsites. NASA says die Mars Airplane could be dedi cated to specific tasks. Among the possibilities are very high-resolution imaging of a large area, allowing detailed geological surveys, and high spatial resolution spectroscopy studies. Other missions could include temperature and pressure measurements over a variety of altitudes and regions, and magnetic and electric field measurements, to give an insight into sub surface structure or even the presence of sub surface water or ice. Detailed gravity measurements could be conducted to provide insights into subsurface structure. "Alternatively, the mission could provide a synthesis of all these disciplines to assist the selection of landing sites in the future," says NASA. The Valles Marineris, four times deeper and six times wider than the US As Grand Canyon, hasnotyetbeen finalised as the target, but is potential ly the most exciting prospect - partic ularly if the glider provides almost real-time coverage via the Internet as the Mars Pathfinder did in 1997. The 4,000km-long VallesMarineris, named after the US Mariner 9 space craft which photographed it in 1971, could offer a magnificent setting for a proj ect originally called Kitty Hawk to celebrate the centenary of the first flight by the Wright brothers in 190 3. The Martian Kitty Hawk was born as a much larger project, the $246 million Mars Airborne Geophysical Explorer (MAGE), pro posed last year. The MAGE was chosen by NASA for the Discoverer programme, but did not make the shortlist of five picked to compete for its Discoverer 7 and 8 missions (Flight Inter national, 25 November-1 December, 1998). As now conceived, the Mars Airplane would be part of a mission flown with France and other international partners in 2003. The mission - to be launched by a European Arianespace Ariane 5 - may be the European Space Agency's French-led Mars Express, which might also carry a UK-built lander called die Beagle. That project has not yet been cleared, however. Alternatively, the mission could become an all- NASA affair, with French space agency CNES providing the Ariane 5 launch commercially. The 2003 Mars Airplane mission would also fly with a small, $40 million Micromission tele communications-relay orbiter, which may be built by commercial space exploration company SpaceDev, based in San Diego, California. The craft would complement the NASA orbital communications network being provided by larger Mars Surveyor programme orbiters. A CNES/NASAMars sample return mission planned for 2005 will carry four Micromission payloads, proposals for which include monitor ing orbiters and surface micropenetrators. • 56 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 10 - 16 March 1999
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