Welcome to Mars

1-The Planet Mars:

• After Schiaparelli's observations in 1877, starting in 1905, Percival Lowell, an American mathematician and astronomer, identified on photographs of the planet Mars certain structures that he interpreted as irrigation canals, which he considered to be of artificial origin and therefore constructed by Martians...



• Percival Lowell was seemingly inspired by the work La planète Mars, written by Camille Flammarion in 1892. Moreover, in Astronomie populaire Camille Flammarion, republished in 1955, one can read the following regarding Mars:
  
  
  • The planet Mars, a miniature Earth (page 285).
  
  
  • At the beginning of this century, only skeptics doubted the existence of Martian life, both animal and plant (page 285).
  
  
  • The existence of life on Mars remains hypothetical, but it is already significant that no observational results are incompatible with this hypothesis, and that some of the evidence gathered supports it (page 298).
  
  
  • It should be noted, however, that the only phenomena we can, without stretching the facts, attribute to biological activity suggest plants, to the exclusion of any form of animal life (page 298).



• Today, after several decades of automated explorations of Mars, we know objectively that: objective que:
  
  
  • Its gravity is three times weaker than that of Earth.
  
  
  • Its atmosphere is 150 times less dense than that of Earth and is composed mainly of carbon dioxide (CO₂). It is therefore unbreathable.
  
  
  • Its average temperature is approximately -65 degrees Celsius.
  
  
  • Its surface is an arid desert covered with very fine dust that "pollutes" the atmosphere and is the cause of violent, darkening storms.
  
  
  • Water is absent (at least on the surface).
  
  
  • There are no magnetic fields protecting its surface from cosmic rays, solar winds, and the like.



• It therefore does not resemble the idea one might have of paradise!

2-Elon Musk, Savior of Humanity?

3-Space Travels:

• Training equivalent to that of elite athletes [06], including the physical preparation necessary for the body to withstand the harsh conditions of space; engineering-level instruction for the inevitable scientific activities; and not to forget mastery of several foreign languages.


• Prolonged absence of Earth's gravity for several months has negative consequences on the human body: bone decalcification, changes in the shape of certain organs and in heart rhythm, significant reduction of muscle mass, disruption of the immune system, sensory problems, and more [07]. Simulating Earth's gravity and giving weight to objects in space remain unresolved issues [08].


• And thus, for a long-duration journey, as is the case for Mars, space travelers will not arrive at their destination in "Olympic" shape...


• In space, encounters are numerous and potentially fatal. On the one hand, celestial bodies, even very small ones, can cause considerable damage, potentially compromising the integrity of the spacecraft. On the other hand, high-energy cosmic rays and the solar wind can induce irreversible biological changes in astronauts' bodies, as well as in the onboard electronic and computer systems.


• While close proximity between several people in a very confined space may be bearable for relatively short periods (a few days or even a few weeks), it becomes problematic for cohabitation over many months or even several years, especially for untrained individuals. Such psychological issues have already been observed in Antarctic bases during the long, dark winters.


• Even though astronauts aboard the ISS [09] undergo numerous medical tests, health problems and accidents cannot be ruled out. It is certain that they have received "first aid" type training, but there are many situations where urgent action is required. What can be done then? We recently saw [10] the case of Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, who were forced to remain in orbit for more than nine months when their mission was originally planned to last only eight days. Thus, space , even nearby, is not easily accessible. This was also one of the failures of the American space shuttles, which were initially designed to be as simple to use as an airplane, but this proved not to be the case. And the farther we get from Earth, the more critical these emergency problems will become.

4-The settlement of Mars:

• Who on Earth will carry out the selection of the one million "privileged" among the billions of humans condemned to death according to the predictions? What will the criteria be? Will they be ethnic, religious, cultural, financial...?


• Who will guarantee that among these colonists there will be a sufficient number of plumbers, hairdressers, teachers, quantum mechanics professors, doctors, psychologists and psychiatrists [13], undertakers...?


• To transport such a large number of people, it will be necessary to place a sufficient number (fifty or so?) per rocket: the habitable volume being necessarily small (equivalent to "two or three buses"?), the "pressure of close quarters" will increase to alarming proportions. But also, how will issues of hygiene, the use of shared toilets... be addressed, problems that are obviously far from trivial? And what will people do during these very long months of transfer? How will they maintain physical fitness? How will they eat and drink? How will they occupy themselves? How will they sleep? How will they handle potential deaths and possible births? What about those who inevitably suffer from space sickness? How will a toothache or a heart attack be treated? How will they endure their neighbor for nine months? How will a leaking faucet be repaired? How will cleanliness be ensured and the absence of various small floating debris and waste, which could then irreversibly enter the respiratory system?


• The colonists will obviously not be able to undergo the long, costly, and necessary training provided to "professionals."


• If indeed the transfer of 1,000,000 colonists is done in "batches" of 50, this implies 20,000 trips. Does this mean that 20,000 rockets will be needed? Or will there be only a certain number (a hundred, for example) making round trips? But two problems then arise: on the one hand, a trip to Mars can only launch from Earth on certain dates if one wants to minimize the distance traveled. On the other hand, it is highly unlikely that there will be service stations on Mars, so how would the rockets be refueled with fuel and oxidizer for the return trip? Finally, if indeed 100 different rockets are used, this means that each would have to complete a total of 200 round trips. Is it possible to achieve such a level of quality and reliability? Moreover, since the duration of a round trip is at least 2 years, this transfer would take at least 200×2 = 400 years! But whether 100 or 20,000 rockets are used, they would contribute to climate disruption due to the pollution caused by their manufacturing and their launch…


• Upon arrival, one must hope that preliminary automated missions will have established a minimum of vital infrastructure. It is worth noting an important difference compared to what European settlers experienced when migrating to the Americas: across the Atlantic, the air was breathable, the water potable, game for food abundant, the land cultivable, and available wood allowed for building shelters and heating... This does not mean life was easy, but none of these advantages will exist upon arrival on Mars...


• This Martian colony of 1,000,000 inhabitants would be equivalent to the city of Marseille, and it is difficult to imagine that it could be possible to transport from Earth the millions of tons of raw materials, the wide variety of equipment, etc., necessary for its construction. Here again, the parallel with the colonization of North America, for example, is interesting: on the one hand, it did not happen in twenty or thirty years, and on the other hand, all the necessary resources were available on site and did not have to be imported from old Europe. If we look more closely at the energy aspect, one or two nuclear reactors are required for the life and activities of a million people. On Mars, given its distance from the Sun and its very thin atmosphere, solar panels and wind turbines would have only low efficiency, and of course, dams are out of the question… So what solutions remain: building one or several EPRs? But we can see the difficulties of such an undertaking in France or the United Kingdom [14], not to mention the fact that such projects require enormous amounts of water and energy, colossal machines, and obviously thousands of engineers and technicians necessarily highly qualified but certainly difficult to motivate to go work on the Red Planet. And besides, who would finance these projects?


• Considerably weakened by the journey, how will the first colonists manage to disembark? Gradually, the veterans will be able to help the newcomers, but in any case, life will not be easy during the first days (and beyond).


• It seems obvious that the first question the colonists might ask upon disembarking is, "What have I come here to do?" [15].


• And indeed, what is there to do over there? No supermarket or cinema in sight... It will be difficult to go for a walk in the desert, encased in spacesuits, and after the romantic strolls under the light of Phobos and Deimos, how will the colonists get rid of the omnipresent fine dust?


• How will the energy necessary for the functioning of the city be produced? How will food and fresh water be produced? Will there be a sufficient supply of mechanical, electronic, and computer spare parts to repair the inevitable and numerous breakdowns?


• Once the colony is established, what will the colonists do with their lives, and how and from what will they live? What activities will there be? What entertainment? Will there be an economy? Which currencies will be used: the Dollar, the Euro, a cryptocurrency, the "Musk"...? Who will govern, preside? Who will guarantee democracy? Who will enforce the law? Who will judge? Who will condemn? Who will punish?


• The colonists will obviously need to reproduce. Will there be sufficient skills to raise the children, educate them, provide medical care...? And another problem: will there be spacesuits planned for them that will "grow" with them as they get older?


• How will "synchronization" be ensured between the inevitable progress on Earth and the colony, and vice versa? Will the two civilizations, that of Earth and that of Mars, diverge irreversibly from each other? Should interplanetary conflicts then be anticipated and feared?


• A one-way journey for the colonists, and especially for those born on-site, their bodies having been shaped and conditioned by the local conditions!

5-It's Party Time!

The Settlement of Mars ('The New World Symphony').

The Settlement of Mars ('Children's Corner').

• [01] And for a very long time still!


• [02] This is particularly the case of Confinity, created in 1998 by Max Levchin, Peter Thiel, Luke Nosek, and Ken Howery, which merged in 2000 with Elon Musk's X.com and was then renamed PayPal in 2001. It is also the case of Tesla, an automobile manufacturer founded in California by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning in 2003. In 2004, Elon Musk joined its capital and then took control in 2007, forcing Martin Eberhard to resign.


• [03] Pollution, climate disruption, armed conflicts, nuclear risks... and in a more distant future-measured in billions of years-our Sun becoming a red giant, "engulfing" the inner planets of the solar system, in particular Earth and Mars (!).


• [04] A few hundred kilometers to reach the ISS, or a few hundred thousand kilometers to return to the Moon. It is worth noting, in passing, that given the enormous current difficulties surrounding this project, the Apollo 11 mission (Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin, and Michael Collins) in July 1969 now seems very distant...


• [05] I myself have conducted simulations of such journeys.


• [06] The comic book Dans la combi de Thomas Pesquet by Marion Montaigne, published by Dargaud in 2017, illustrates this in detail with a lot of humor. In particular, it shows that many actions familiar to us-such as using the toilet-become feats in space...


• [07] This can be observed firsthand when astronauts return to Earth after a mission of several months on the ISS and have to be carried out of their spacecraft. They then have to wait several weeks for, in particular, their muscle strength to be restored.


• [08] In most science fiction films, one can see immense spacecraft (for example, the Enterprise in the Star Trek films and series) in which the characters walk normally on floors that appear horizontal. But where does the necessarily artificial grAvity come from? It is better not to ask the question...
  
  In 2001: A Space Odyssey, directed by Stanley Kubrick and released in 1968 based on a screenplay by the director and Arthur C. Clarke (after his two short stories The Dawn of Man and The Sentinel), we can see David Bowman, the commander of the ship Discovery One en route to Jupiter, jogging (to stay in shape) in a part of the spacecraft that rotates perpendicular to its velocity vector, the induced centrifugal force "simulating" Earth gravity.
  
  This appealing and seemingly easy-to-implement solution is often mentioned. But in fact, it is almost impractical due to the Coriolis force (an inertial force related to a change in reference frame) which, being orthogonal to the rotating surface, would add to or subtract from (depending on the direction of movement) the centrifugal force, thereby increasing or decreasing the apparent weight. To limit the effects of the Coriolis force, an enormous radius would be required, incompatible with what is achievable today (or tomorrow!) in terms of spacecraft design.
  
  It is worth noting in passing that the spaceship Rama, imagined by Arthur C. Clarke in the eponymous 1973 novel, is a cylinder 50 km long and 20 km in diameter, rotating at a speed of about one turn every four minutes, thereby providing one-quarter of Earth gravity on its surface.
  
  For more information on this topic, see the article Pesanteur artificielle: le défi de l'activité physique dans l'espace (Artificial Gravity: The Challenge of Physical Activity in Space) by Jean-Christophe Caillon, published in issue 573 (07/2025) of Pour la Science.


• [09] The ISS (International Space Station) is an international scientific station (Canada, Europe, Japan, Russia, and the USA) orbiting the Earth at an altitude of approximately 410 kilometers.


• [10] In 2024 and 2025.


• [11] Provided the departure and return dates are carefully chosen!


• [12] But incidentally, who will pay: the colonists or Elon Musk?


• [13] And there will need to be some on-site!


• [14] As of October 2025, there are currently two EPRs (Evolutionary Power Reactor) projects under construction in Europe. The first is Flamanville 3 in France, whose construction began in December 2007 and which is still not operational. With a maximum output of 1600 MWe, its cost is expected to reach 24 billion euros. The second is Hinkley Point C in the United Kingdom. Its two units are expected to produce 3200 MWe by 2030, with a budget that is also skyrocketing and is currently estimated at 50 billion euros. On this site, the SGC-250 Sarens crane, with a capacity of 250,000 tonne-meters, is being used—and it is hard to see how something similar could be done on Mars!


• [15] A modern version of the famous line Que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère? (What on earth was he doing in that galley?") (Molière, Les Fourberies de Scapin, Act 2, Scene XI).