About habitats playing a role in terraforming Mars.

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, jwsmith42000@... wrote:
>
> I can agree with this. Since this group is mostly off planet
centric and I am
> more planet centric I try to keep my post in measure with the
groups aims. I
> do learn things here but I will post this on planetary,
specifically Mars
> living.
>
> I have an almost unique view of colonizing Mars. When we do
colonize Mars we
> will depend on orbiting habitats much more than on relying on
Earth.
> I do not believe that the population of Mars will ever be more than
20,000
> people until we do completely terraform it. The settlements will
not be like
> anything that most people envision until it is terraformed. There
will be no
> large cities, surface or underground. The reason is because most of
these kinds of
> structures will not stand up under even lite bombardment by
asteroids to
> supply additional material for terraforming.
>
> Most of the material to terraform Mars is already present on Mars
and the
> necessity of bombarding Mars with asteroids can be avoided for the
most part.
>
> Using currently available methods and appliances we can
successfully colonize
> Mars and build self sufficient orbiting habitats now. We should do
this as
> soon as the money allows. None of it will look like the pictures we
have seen
> but the installations will be functional and will lead to
installations that
> look somewhat the pictures we have all seen.
>
> 1000Planets, Inc. is working on this as hard and as fast as we can.
We work
> on the project a lot. We do not say a lot to the outside world, but
when we are
> ready we will do that.
>
> John Wayne
>
the big problem with terriforming mars, or even living there, is that
it has lost its van allen belt. a long time ago when there was water,
and air on the planet, and possibly life, it had a magnetic field,
which, like ours captured ion radiation and used it to protect the
planet. for some reason it disappeared. shortly after that it started
getting hit by asteroids that were not being slowed by the
atmosphere, indicating that much of the astmosphere had been lost.
this was most likely due to the solar winds. while they are weak,
they can over time strip a planet of much of its upper atmosphere. If
there could be a way of restoring that, and bringing in ice asteriods
and comets, the atmosphere could be restored and it would be liveable
without increasing the size of the planet by metal and rock asteroids.