There is a 100% chance of dying on Mars. Why Elon Musk’s plans are suicide for astronauts?
By: Adele Romanenkova
Tags: Space, Mars, Radiation, Space Travel, Elon Musk

The Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences revealed the radiation dose astronauts are going to receive during the long months of flight.

Photo: Shutterstock

The historical event — actually the gratest or at least one of the greatest in the history of humanity — is going to take place in 2024, according to Elon Musk. And the billionaire doesn’t rule out that one day he will go to Mars himself and doesn’t mind even dying on the fourth planet.

“Just not on the impact,” he said.

According to the measuring instruments installed on board the Curiosity Rover, in one sol (which is 39 minutes longer than Earth’s day) on the surface of the planet, you can get 0.21 millisieverts of radiation. This is about 50 times more than we get on Earth.

But this is not the main problem. What will it be like for the astronauts and perhaps for Elon Musk to get to the coveted new world? And this will actually take at least six months, or even nine.

Employees of “uranium mines‘‘ are allowed to receive 20 millisieverts a year, says Vyacheslav Shurshakov, head of the laboratory of methods and means of radiation safety during space flight in the Institute of Biomedical Problems of Russian Academy of Sciences . And astronauts, according to him, get 220 a year. For the entire career, both are allowed to gain no more than 1000 millisieverts.

“If you count 20 a year, you can happily say that you can work in a uranium mine for 50 years,” explains Shurshakov. “And in space, we divide that by 220 and get four years and a half. That is, formally, you can stay on space stations for a total of four and a little years. No one has ever flown so much before. There are several record-breaking people who have spent more than 800 days in space”.

But the orbital station is still located in the area of the Earth’s magnetic field. Now let’s try to fly away. The IBP RAS scientist stated that the radiation will be three times higher than on the ISS. The generally accepted estimated duration of a round trip to Mars is 500 days, which is a year and four months.

“If you approach the question formally, it turns out that on the way to Mars and back just the same 1000 millisieverts are collected. This means that you can fly to Mars and back, strictly speaking, once in a lifetime,” says Shurshakov.

And what if we stay on Mars to build a colony? Then the scientist’s estimations lead us to the following: we have already landed with five hundred millisieverts in our bodies, and every year (again, based on Curiosity measurements) 76 millisieverts will be added to our bank. After six and a half years, we don’t have to go back to Earth.

“If you start from the “see Mars and die“ approach, then this is one thing, but if you count on caravans of rockets that will rush us forward from star to star, then it is a little bit different”, assures the scientist.

In addition, the conquerors of Mars should be aware of the existence of solar proton events — powerful radiation flashes that occur on average every eleven years and are currently impossible to predict. This can happen both in nine years or in seven. And there are also outbreaks that increase radiation by all 500 times. This happens, however, once in a thousand years, but it can happen at any time.

What will then happen to the astronauts?

If people are caught in flight by the same proton event, it is quite possible to expect the so-called acute radiation effect with all the corresponding symptoms, the scientist believes. A person suddenly begins to vomit, he loses consciousness, he has a disorder of thinking, coordination of movements is disrupted.

“In addition, radiation leads to premature body aging,” warns Shurshakov. “A person does not just have severe diseases that shorten life (cancer and others), but simply one’s blood circulation and hematopoiesis deteriorates, the Central nervous system works worse, memory deteriorates and so forth. So, as scientists have calculated, 1000 millisieverts is equivalent to a reduction in human life expectancy by about three years”.

How could you protect yourself from radiation in space?

1. Shelter

The idea is to have some kind of room aboard the ship with thick walls where we could hide from the flow of ionized particles. According to Shurshakov, the proton event lasts about one to three days long. All the walls on the ship can’t be made that thick. It‘s too expensive, too massive. But you

can make some small compartment where the astronaut can sit out the required number of days.

2. A part of the Earth

This is about installing a device on the ship that will play the role of a miniature version of our planet, thus, creating a magnetic field similar to the Earth‘s. It will deflect the particles and thus protect astronauts.

3. Antiradiation cure

There are pills that can reduce the harm of ionizing radiation. They are intended for radiation accident liquidators and, according to Shurshakov, are not used in space. But science does not stand still, and probably in the coming years, radiation medications will appear in the first-aid kits of astronauts.

So far, none of this is in the arsenal of cosmonautics. But a few years ago, Russian scientists found a relatively simple way to strengthen protection for astronauts — so to speak, from improvised means.

“Once my colleague at the Institute, who supplies personal hygiene products to the ISS, gave me a napkin to hold in my hand,” Shurshakov recalls. “I was surprised: it was sealed in a plastic bag and quite heavy. And I asked: “Is there water inside?“ She said: “Yes, water with some shampoo added”. And physicists know that water is a good protector from space radiation.”

As a result, they decided to create a so-called protection curtain. You can see it in the photo below: gray “mattresses“ along the wall are stuffed with those napkins. Water and polyethylene increased protection from radiation by five times.

A “protection curtain” aboard the International Space Station. Photo: The Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences

All the estimations stated above leave us with serious concerns that currently a manned flight to Mars for astronauts seems to be actually almost equal to suicide, and the future Martian city looks like a city of unfortunate people smited with radiation sickness. There is no doubt that humans will land on Mars, but now we seem to be too defenceless in the face of severe solar winds and galactic rays.