Researcher Warns Space Weather Hole Blocks Manned Mars Mission(Forwarded)

Press and Media Relations
University of Warwick
Coventry, U.K.

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Dr Claire Foullon
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Peter Dunn
Press and Media Relations Manager, University of Warwick
Tel: 024 76 523708 or 07767 655860

2nd August 2005

Researcher Warns Space Weather Hole Blocks Manned Mars Mission

Research published in the journal Space Weather warns that massive gaps in
our understanding and monitoring of space weather will effectively block
US plans for a manned mars space mission. The study, led by University of
Warwick researcher Dr Claire Foullon, draws on work that Dr Foullon and
colleagues carried out for the European Space Agency on radiation hazards
and space weather.

Dr Foullon points to particular concerns about the radiation dangers of
Solar Proton Events (SPEs) particularly those that follow Coronal Mass
Ejections (CMEs -- massive clouds of material ejected from the Sun that
produce dangerous, high energy, charged particles). One of the largest
such events ever recorded arrived at Earth in August 1972 right between
NASA's Apollo 16 and 17 manned missions. Simulations of the radiation
levels an astronaut inside a spacecraft would have experienced during this
event found that the astronaut would have absorbed lethal doses of
radiation within just 10 hours. It was simply good luck that this happened
between the missions.

Since then a number of satellite missions have been able to give advanced
warnings of SPE & CME events and revealed much about their workings but
that monitoring and understanding today still only relates to a tiny part
of our Solar System -- literally just the line between Earth and the Sun.
A manned Mars mission will travel far beyond the boundaries of our current
understanding and observation. While we have an increasing understanding
the impact of SPEs in and around the Earth we have no idea if the same
holds true for the geometry of space around the rest of the changing area
between Earth, Mars and the Sun. Nor do we know if the current models of
what happens in these events between the Sun and Earth can be accurately
extrapolated to understand what happens over the greater distances between
the Sun and Mars. Dr Foullon believes those knowledge gaps are currently
simply too large and too dangerous to allow a manned Mars mission.

However the research outlines opportunities to learn from upcoming space
weather related satellite launches and makes 3 recommendations that could
plug the holes in our understanding sufficiently to allow a manned Mars
mission to proceed in relative safety. There are a number of upcoming
space weather related satellite launches that could be key to that but the
2005 Stereo mission and the 2008-9 Solar Sentinels programme are of
particular value. The recommendations a

Firstly Mars planners should pay particular attention to the Stereo, and
the part of the Solar Sentinels programme which will place a satellite
facing the opposite side of the Sun to Earth. They should aim to replicate
those missions just before a manned Mars mission launch with a package of
3 satellites integrated into a single mission designed specifically to
provide space weather warnings for a Mars mission. Two of the satellites
in that Mars package to be positioned this side of the Sun like Stereo and
one on the other side of the sun like one of the planned Solar Sentinels.
Another option outlined in Dr Foullon's paper is that one could instead
plan a package of satellites with one in a Stereo style position with two
satellites in the L1 and L2 Sun-Mars Lagrange points.

Secondly there must be considerable research to develop a lightweight
mechanism to be installed on the manned mission to give some early warning
of dangerous space weather. While we have some clues as to how that might
be done the technology is not yet there to deliver a workable solution.

Lastly particular attention should be paid to the data from the various
upcoming space weather missions to develop a more robust model of how
dangerous space weather propagates over larger distances than the "simple"
path that we most understand between the Sun and Earth.

The original paper can be found at:
http://www.agu.org/journals/sw/swa/f...d=2004SW000134