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> accelerating a Mir-sized craft towards Mars and decelerating it to orbit while keeping the crew alive ... and having enough fuel to accelerate back to Earth .
by redahs 11y ago
> accelerating a Mir-sized craft towards Mars and decelerating it to orbit while keeping the crew alive ... and having enough fuel to accelerate back to Earth ...
You don't need to ship enough fuel to return to Earth in the same trip as a manned crew.
You can send orbital depots for return fuel and ascent\descent vehicles ahead of time in unmanned missions. This could be done multiple years in advance.
When you are launching the crew and interplanetary habitat, you only need to bring enough fuel for a one way trip.
- rbanffy 11y agoIt's true, and a clever approach. Since the orbiting propellant depots on Mars would have gotten there with engines, the simplest approach would be to dock the Mars departure vehicle (which could just be the service module of the Mars ascent vehicle) and dock it to the propellant depot and use it as a propulsion stage to match the trajectory of the next cycler passing by. Docking that vehicle with the cycler would allow any extra fuel to be used for trajectory corrections. As long as the mass you are adding to the cycler has propellant and an engine, there is no big issue with adding it.