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Send Astronauts to Mars —and Leave Them There

Why a one-way ticket is the best way to the red planet

By Jane Yager, Newser Staff

Posted Sep 1, 2009 11:43 AM CDT

(Newser) – The most feasible way to get humans on Mars is to offer retirement-age astronauts one-way tickets to live out their last days on the red planet. Say what? It's not as crazy as it sounds, writes scientist Lawrence Krauss in the New York Times, who believes his plan would solve the major hurdles of a space mission to Mars.

For starters, cost. The trip would be far less expensive without requiring fuel—and thus a bigger ship—for a return trip. Also, the journey would likely subject astronauts to a life-shortening dose of radiation. Thus, a one-way space shuttle for 65-plus astronauts. Krauss thinks there'd be plenty of takers, and "human space travel is so expensive and so dangerous that we are going to need novel, even extreme solutions if we really want to expand the range of human civilization beyond our own planet."

[Images (4)]

[Quotes (3)]

This artist's rendering released by NASA shows the 2009 Mars Science Laboratory on the surface of Mars. (AP Photo/NASA/JPL-Caltech)

This image provided by NASA shows a view from NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander's Stereo Surface Imager's left eye after delivery of soil to the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer (TEGA) oven, June 6, 2008. (AP Photo/NASA)

This artist's rendering provided by NASA shows the lander dubbed Phoenix Mars. (AP Photo/NASA)

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope took this picture of Mars in 2003. (AP Photo/NASA, FILE)

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I have found a significant fraction of scientists older than 65 who would be willing to live out their remaining years on the red planet or elsewhere. - Lawrence M. Krauss

While the idea of sending astronauts aloft never to return is jarring upon first hearing, the rationale for one-way trips into space has both historical and practical roots.
- Lawrence M. Krauss

Colonists and pilgrims seldom set off for the New World with the expectation of a return trip, usually because the places they were leaving were pretty intolerable anyway. - Lawrence M. Krauss

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Send Astronauts to Mars —and Leave Them There