In the space race, it’s Mars or bust

Mars or bust! This is what it could come down to it if this Sunday’s landing of Curiosity fails. NASA bills it as “seven minutes of terror.” That’s no lie, either. It takes just seven minutes for any probe to rip through the thin atmosphere of Mars.

This rover is about the size of a small compact car. It weighs 1,982 pounds. It will hit Mars’ atmosphere at 13,000 mph. Seven minutes later, it must be at zero mph. That is the terror part. Everything — from the aero braking maneuvers, deployment of the supersonic chute, the heat shield dropping away, the lander package rockets firing as it drops from its shell and the final lowering of Curiosity from the rocket lander to the ground — must all work or it will be a disaster for the mission.

Oh, there is another kicker. It takes 14 minutes for a radio signal to travel from Mars to Earth. And it takes another 14 minutes for the reply from Earth to be transmitted to Mars. It is not hard to imagine the entire crew running this from both NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory turning shades of blue on Sunday. With luck, no one will pass out and the rover will touch down safe and sound on the surface of the red planet. That is, if everything works right. Mars does have a reputation of destroying a lot of spacecraft.

The mission will be worth it. If this plucky rover lands intact, it will search for life on another world, living or fossil. The ingredients are all there. Other probes in orbit, rovers and landers, have found ample evidence for them all. It is just a matter of time finding proof of life there. And when Curiosity or another finds life signs, well, it will be a major milestone in human history. It will be proof life exists out there among the other planets in our tiny corner of the universe.

Mars has always fascinated me. From the H.G. Wells thriller “War of the Worlds” of book, radio and movie fame, to the thrilling stories of Edgar Rice Burroughs starting with the book “A Princess of Mars.” Burroughs spins the awesome, swashbuckling tales of John Carter, an Earth man who finds himself battling the green hordes of Tharks for the hand of his princess love, Dejah Thoris. On the dried up and dead sea bottoms of what be known as Barsoom, he becomes in the end the Warlord of Mars. These were wonderful tales of fantasy and early science fiction, tales I still love to read, if only to recapture the wonder of my childhood and teenage years.

But it was the reality of the spacecraft that touched down on Mars that still grabs my attention. From the first pictures beamed back by Vikings 1 and 2 and Pathfinder, to the twin odysseys of Spirit and Opportunity with jaw-dropping vistas captured in their epic seven-plus-year missions. These have made Mars not only a fun fantasy of my youth, but a near obsession in adulthood.

What a world it is. Mars has a canyon, the Valles Marineris, that if put on Earth would stretch across the United States from coast to coast. A volcano called Olympus Mons makes Denali seem like an anthill. It rises up 14 miles. Some features were carved by huge floods of water that reached Biblical proportions millions of years ago. It has dust storms that can nearly envelop the planet. And those are just some of the sights.

You can watch it live on the Internet. Just link up with the NASA or JPL websites and go on from there. With luck, Curiosity will bring on the excitement and drama of exploration. It’s Mars or bust! Wish the little guy luck. I know I am.

Wasilla resident Daniel D. Grota retired from the U.S. Army after more than 21 years of service.