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by Cameron McPherson Smith
An expedition can generally defined as a voyage with a defined goal, carried out in an environment in where there are sufficient unknowns to make the outcome impossible to predict. Early humans migrating across the Earth were not really on planned expeditions, but moving seasonally as hunter-gatherers. When they began to settle into certain regions, and explore the boundaries of those regions, planning to return to a home base, human expeditions really began. Just as astronauts today have to think out every item of equipment, a time-frame and all the variables of their voyage, people in the distant past had to prepare stone tools, specialized clothing, vehicles (e.g. canoes) and time-frames (e.g. seasonal). While languages have changed over the millennia, I suspect that all explorers could be friends, thinking in the same terms: distances to cover, modes of transportation, staying alive with food, water and shelter, being able to laugh at misfortune, and carry on, and so forth. Preparing an expedition plan sets your mind into the same state as that of many of our ancestors; it can connect you to your distant relatives as well as the future explorers of Mars.
This section of the MARS-ICE educational project is meant to introduce you to the art of planning an expedition, to activate in your mind the same sorts of thoughts used to plan every expedition ever undertaken. In this assignment, you identify a geographical feature on Mars, and plan how you would explore it, accounting for time in the field, resupply, goals to be accomplished, and other critical variables. The final product will be a plan you can really imagine in action. You can also think in terms of the best-case and worst-case scenarios, and adjust your plan accordingly. What if your radio quits when you're hundreds of kilometers from base camp? You had better have a plan for that.
Assignment: Make a detailed Expedition Plan for the exploration of some geogrphical feature on Mars. Include a map, lists of equipment and consumables, and discuss your objective(s), methods of achieving that goal, and saftey precautions.
The following guidelines will help you put together this Expedition Plan. The list is a set of guidelines I have used for many years in expedition planning, and they are the basic chapter titles for a book I am writing on exactly this topic.
1. Identify a Geographical Feature to Explore on Mars
The first thing to do is decide what you want to do, and this will depend on the terrain you wish to explore. Mars, like Earth, has a wide variety of environments: polar ice caps, dune seas, craters, canyon systems, rubble-strewn plains dusted with snow, and more. Even though Mars is only about half the size of Earth, there's more land to explore on Mars: about 70% of Earth's surface is under water, whereas no oceans currently exist on Mars. So, finding a feature you want to examine can be challenging. Mars is an entire planet with landscapes, some just like those on Earth, waiting to be explored!.
A great place to start is at the US Geological Survey's Mars Explorer. On this map of Mars, you can simply click on any feature you think is of interest: craters, canyons, even the 'blank' areas can be fascinating. Once you zoom in, you have to consider the scale of the features. On this map, the image you get after just one click is about 120 miles from top to bottom or side to side: each time you zoom in, you decrease the scale (two clicks=60 miles across, three clicks=30 miles across). Download, print, or sketch the map, and divide it with a grid, to give you a basic idea of the scale of your expedition area. Here's an example:
Image downloaded after just one click. You're looking straight down on the terrain, as from a plane. Keep note of the Latitude and Longitude markers (look in a geography or science book to get an idea of how these work: they're basically a grid system used to pinpoint positions) on the corners; these will be used to pinpoint your position, but they don't get downloaded from the website.
60-mile grid superimposed in black lines, equally dividing the region into squares. Each degree of latitude or longitude = about 30 miles. I've added the Latitude and Longitude markers, for 0, 1, 2, 3 and 4 degrees south, and 97-100 degrees west: mark these on your map as well.
The example above can familiarize you with the Latitude and Longitude system, which is prety simple, just being a grid used to locate a position. It can also help you start to formulate a plan. In this case, how long do you think the trip would take? If you are on foot, a lot longer than in a vehicle! A vehicle may make 10 miles per hour in medium terrain, or only 3 miles per hour in rocky terrain. Planning your timeline (see below) is a major step which will effect everything else. The first step, making a map and measuring your route, is sketched out above. Be sure to put a scale on your map, and measure your distances as accurately as you can: a slight error in planning can mean days of delay in the field. 2. Describe Your Goal In this example, I am doing the purest exploration: setting out from a base to explore terrain only known by a few satellite images. If you already know about some Mars surface features, you may want to start with a more specific goal; in any case, you need to start with a map, as I mentioned above. The goal statement can be as simple or complex as you like. A simple goal may be 'To explore the canyon systems within three degress S and W of base camp', or as elaborate as 'To expore the crater rim at (some point) in detail, seeking evidence of the age of the crater by collecting samples for chemical analysis'. Feel free to pick scientific, purely exploratory or adventure goals, such as climbing a mountain, or being the first to explore a certain region (plenty of scope there on Mars!). Your statement really needs to be made before you present the map in your expedition plan, but here we looked at the map first to help specify our goal. 3. Establish a Plan of Action and a Time Frame As you just found out, the scale of the area you want to explore will dictate your Plan of Action and the Time Frame. Using a scale, detail your movements: exactly how many miles (or km) are you going to travel? How far can you travel in an average expedition day? Will you travel non-stop, or do you need to collect samples on the way? Set up a daily timeline, such as the one below: The first thing you'll learn on an expedition is that most plans have to be revised once you get in the field: conditions are a little different than you expected, or a piece of equipment fails on day 1, and so on: so you have to be flexible. But, you also have to be a good planner, and a daily timeline, even if only for rough purposes, is essential. Space shuttle astronauts today have their activities planned down to the second; the plan includes time for rest and relaxation, and sleep, eating and using the bathroom, and can be flexible, but the concept is to be aware of the passage of time and to make sure it is not wasted. Here, I plan for travelling in pressurized rovers, stopping at noon for some sample collection and food, but generally with the purpose of travelling as far as possible each day. Adjust your plan as you prefer. Remember, people need a good amount of time to eat, talk, plan activities, recover from work, and occasionally relax, if they are to stay effective. You need to consider this. Once your daily plan is generally established, it can help you decide how far you can expect to travel each day, by multiplying your average speed (say 6mph for a wheeled exploratory vehicle) by the hours of travel per day. In this case, I'm doing 6mph x 7.5 hours per day = 45 miles per day. If my route is roughly 200 miles long (a very rough estimate here), I need to plan for a minimum of 4.4 days. However, this does not account for crossing those huge canyons, which would take time. If I add 1 day per crossing for each of the roughly 13 crossings, we get 17.4 days, minimum. Add 10 days for repairs, being trapped by poor weather, and other problems, and you are out for 27.4 days. At an absolute minimum, I would carry a month's supplies for this voyage, even though on paper, it looks like it could be done much more quickly. Once on expedition, planning continues, to deal with unforseen circumstances: here an expedition team is meeting in Ecuador to refine plans, two months into one of my previous expeditions.
4. Specify Your Expedition Team Requirements Naturally, each expedition will require people with different skills: a medic is always a good idea, and on Mars, geologists, atmospheric scientists will be invaluable. So will mechanics to fix vehicles, pilots or drivers to move them, people with climbing skills to investigate features no robot can examine, and so on. Consider how many people you need to make the voyage, and list their skills. In my 1998 expedition, I was the Expedition Archaeologist, but I was also assigned the duty of designing and making, by hand the 40-foot sails used to propel our experimental craft on the Pacific; a major job! I did what was needed, learned the skill, and built the sails. Every expedition member must be prepared to be flexible and make themselves as useful as possible. 5. List Your Equipment With your goals and travel route outlined, you need to consider the tools you will use to accomplish the task. Tools can be as simple as a pair of binoculars or as complex as an airplane. Every expedition is planned with list after list of equipment, always being refined to lighten the load and make the gear as durable and versatile as possible. That list is checked again and again; a 'quartermaster' is generally assigned the job of keeping close track of where every item is, at all times. In this picture you can see a small part two tons of expedition gear being prepared for an expedition. Consider breaking the gear down into categories: One of the great satisfactions I get from expeditions is making and preparing my own gear. Inventing gear that does not yet exist, or modifying gear that does not quite meet your requirements, is great fun and great mental exercise. If it doesn't exist, invent it! I've invented and used many items of equipment for my expeditions. Some have been good, others bad. One of the worst ideas was that rather than carry a tent or other shelter across the ice cap, I would just camp under the surface, covered by a tarp! Though the idea was ultimately not so great, it was a good mental exercise, and was useful in planning for emergencies. My expedition to Iceland is no different: you can examine one of my expedition gear checklists here. In addition to listing the gear, estimate it's weight, because more weight means using more fuel. Keep in mind you may need to add items not even in the categories above, and/or add additional categories. Really try to imagine being there, on the ground, ready to start exploring; what would you need? Explorers' lives often are dependent on their equipment, so be careful! 6. List Your Consumables Consumables are anything that you consume daily and can run out of with disastrous consequences, such as food, water, fuel for stoves and vehicles and, on Mars, air. How many meals do you need for your crew for the time you would be out? What is your fuel economy, and what reserves will you take? Try listing: Can you carry all of this in a backpack? A motorcycle-like vehicle? Or do you need trucks for a many-month-long expedition? 7. Establish Saftey Procedures What can go wrong? What might happen that could jeopardize the saftey of your crew? Consider the terrain, the things you would be doing, and the equipment you're planning to use. You should have procedures set out for the most likely sources of problems. For instance, in the current example, I expect the greatest dificulties to come in crossing the canyons: that is where I'm most likely to lose control of the vehicles, which is my greatest concern. A saftey procedure for making such a crossing might include a sequence of steps to be carried out at each crossing: This sort of procedure must be worked out in advance, tested, refined, and practiced. Expeditions are labor-intensive in terms of planning and preparation. 8. Summarize the Plan Now that you have thing sketched out, take some time to think over the plan. Ask what other people think: they may have an objective viewpoint that comes from not being involved in the planning. Ask yourself which of your estimates are least reliable: that is, where are you most likely to be wrong in your calculations and plans? Examine those with great care, because expeditions can succeed or fail based on the simplest miscalculation in the planning stages. If I accidentally order 10 days of food rather than 100 days, I am going to fail almost immediately, and just a single one-digit typo is easy to make. Comment on why you think your plan can succeed, as well as on how you could improve your plans. In this exercise, you have been introduced to some basic concepts in expedition planning. Obviously, much more is involved. It often takes years to plan an expedition that may only be a month long. For me, planning never stops. Riding on a bus, or just relaxing in a bath, I'm always re-asessing my expedition plans to make them safer and more efficient. One of my recent gear lists, marked up as I rode a bus to work, is here: as you can see, the revisions are continual. |
