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Introduction and Mission Summary

Jaret B. Matthews

1.1.1 Introduction
On December 19, 1972 Apollo 17 astronauts returned to Earth after
spending 75 hours on the surface of the Moon. Little did they know that they took
part in what was to be humanity’s last venture beyond low Earth orbit for nearly
thirty years. At the time of their return it was assumed that Mars was the next
destination that NASA would open to humanity’s grasp. However, this proved not
to be the case.
Though several notable Mars mission architectures have been proposed
over the years, all have been met with substantial criticism. Because of concerns
about inordinate costs, high risks to crew safety and mission success, and
extremely long timelines, the proposed architectures have not fared well in the
face of public scrutiny.
The architecture for Mars missions took a significant turn with the
publication of Dr. Robert Zubrin’s book A Case for Mars: A Plan to Settle the Red
Planet and Why we Must. In this book, Dr. Zubrin popularized a mission strategy
known as in-situ resource utilization (ISRU). ISRU is characterized by the
exploitation of indigenous resources on the surface of another planet. ISRU has
revived a once dead hope for the human exploration of Mars by revolutionizing
the way engineers and scientists think about interplanetary exploration.
By incorporating ISRU into the Project PERforM mission, we were able to
launch off of Earth without the fuel to return home. The mass of a propellant
production plant being far lighter than that of the required propellant to lift off
Mars, several tones (metric tons) are saved by simply manufacturing rocket fuel
on the surface.
Mars missions have also been out of favor because of the perception that
going there involves unacceptable amounts of risk to crew safety. While a Mars
mission is inherently more dangerous than a Lunar mission simply because of
the distance and time away from Earth, with planning, a crew could be ensured

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significantly more survivability than in previous mission architectures.
Incorporating a free-return trajectory developed by Professor James Longuski of
Purdue University and Masa Okutsu, a graduate student at Purdue, Project
PERforM is able to return the crew safely back to Earth even in the face of nearly
total loss of propulsive capability.
Safety is further buttressed by the incorporation of zero-altitude abort
options both on Earth and on Mars. Also, in the event of a zero-altitude abort on
Mars, the crew have available to them, in the immediate area, 100% backups in
the form of a second set of launch/earth return vehicles. Implementation of such
measures has helped us to mitigate some of the traditionally risk intensive
aspects of a human mission to Mars.
In addition, we surmounted several other historical impediments to human
Mars exploration in the Project PERforM architecture. The debilitating effects of
prolonged exposure to micro gravity are overcome by employing tethers to
produce artificial gravity both on the way to and from Mars. Propellant
requirements are lessened not only by in-situ production, but also by
incorporating aerobraking and aerocapture maneuvers, which taper purely
propulsive delta velocity requirements.
Excessive costs are kept at bay by implementing nuclear thermal rockets,
whose high performance have allowed us to use an existing launch vehicle.
Concurrently, by evading the need to develop a new launch vehicle we are also
afforded the ability to build around a rather rapid schedule.
It is in the spirit of in-situ resource utilization that Project PERForM set out
about designing this mission. While the aspects of our mission are certainly not
individually groundbreaking, it is the use of novel techniques in concert that has
allowed us to reasonably achieve the goal of designing a low cost, safe, and
highly successful mission to Mars.

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1.1.1 Mission Directives
The following mission directives were assigned at the beginning of the
mission design process.
 Mission should focus on minimizing cost
 Crew survival rate must be greater than 95%
 Mission success rate must be greater than 80%
 Artificial gravity must be provided to crew if time of flight is in excess of
180 days
 Crew must contain 2 dedicated science personnel
 Mission should serve as a “stepping stone” for future missions

1.1.3 Mission Summary

The Trip to Mars
The journey to Mars begins on November 9, 2011. A fully fueled, modified,
Russian Energia heavy launch vehicle sits patiently on the pad at Cape
Canaveral, Florida. The massive Earth Launch Vehicle (ELV) towers high into the
autumn Florida air. The ELV, larger than the Saturn V, was in production in the
1980’s and its facilities were brought back on line for the mission to Mars.
Atop the ELV sits the Earth Return Assembly
(ERA) (see Fig. 1.1.1). The ERA consists of the Earth ERA
Return Vehicle, the Mars Garage, the Mars Launch
Vehicle, and the Crew Transfer Vehicle. The unmanned
ERA is being launched towards Mars more than two
years ahead of the crew.
The Earth Return Vehicle (ERV) is a crew living ELV
area stocked with consumables for the six-month return
trip to Earth. Just above the ERV rests the Mars Garage
(MG). The MG houses the long-range rover, which will
serve as the primary means of transportation for the crew
on the surface of Mars. Fig. 1.1.1 ERA & ELV.

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 Stacked above the garage is the Mars Launch Vehicle (MLV). An amazing
piece of hardware, the MLV is outfitted with its own propellant production plant.
Blasting off Earth virtually un-fueled, the MLV will actually manufacture its own
rocket fuel from the thin Martian atmosphere.
The final component that comprises the ERA is the Crew Transfer Vehicle
(CTV). The CTV is a small lifting-body craft that serves not only as the crew’s
means of landing on Earth, but also as an effective instrument in surviving a
launch failure off the surface of Mars.
The ELV rumbles aloft as it transports the ERA to low-earth orbit (LEO).
After a short checkout period in LEO, the ERA is hurled into a trans-Mars
injection by the upper stage of the ELV, the Nuclear Thermal Rocket (NTR) (see
Fig. 1.1.2).
Though the NTR is primarily used to lob the ERA towards Mars, its
purpose is far from served. By converting the heat continually produced in the
NTR’s idling reactors, the ERA is provided
with ample power for the trip to Mars.
On September 11, 2012, after
more than 300 days in space, the ERA
jettisons the NTR in preparation for
landing on Mars. Slamming into the
Martian atmosphere at 5.56 km/s, the
ERA uses an aerocapture maneuver to Fig 1.1.2 ERA is placed into trans-
mars injection via the NTR.
place itself into orbit around Mars. Once
in orbit, the ERV is separated from the rest of the ERA. At this point, solar panels
and a high gain antenna are unfurled from the ERV so that it may serve as a
communications satellite supporting exchanges to and from the surface of Mars.
After separation from the ERV, the garage, the MLV, and the CTV deorbit
to land on Mars. Plunging into the atmosphere, the vehicle is slowed to subsonic
speeds by parachutes. At this time, the garage is jettisoned and allowed to land
under its own parachutes. Firing retro-rockets, the MLV and CTV gently land near
the garage.

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 The single-stage to orbit MLV now has fifteen months to make enough fuel
for the return trip home. Just after touchdown, a 100kw nuclear reactor is rolled
out from beneath the MLV. The reactor is used to power the MLV’s methanol and
liquid oxygen production plant. If the plant fails to produce enough fuel for the
return trip, the crew will simply remain safe back on Earth.
However, should all go well, on January 14, 2014 the crew will lift off from
the Cape by way of another ELV/NTR stack.
Perched atop this ELV is the Habitation Module
(Hab), a roomy, two storied, lifting body vehicle that
will serve as the crew’s home for the journey out to
Mars and while on the surface (see Fig. 1.1.3).
Similar to the ERV, the Hab is propelled
towards Mars via an NTR. The Hab’s trajectory
however, is unique. Available only during a short
window around mid January 2014, is a free-return
trajectory via a Venus flyby. This trajectory ensures,
even in the face of nearly complete loss of
Fig. 1.1.3 Hab & ELV.
propulsive capability, a safe return to Earth within
800 days. Should anything go wrong on the 172-day transit out to Mars the crew
can simply opt not to land and “coast” back home.
Following the NTR injection burn,
the Hab and NTR spin up to 2 rpm before
separating to deploy a 325 m long tether.
Once deployed, the assembly is again
spun to achieve .38g’s, the equivalent to
Martian gravity (see Fig. 1.1.4).
The tether serves to acclimate the
Fig. 1.1.4 Hab and NTR separate to
crew to the conditions that they will be deploy to a tether.
living in for the next two years. Similar to
the ERA, power is drawn from the idling NTR reactors. The power produced is
fed to the Hab by way of a cable running the length of the tether. Should this

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critical system fail, the Hab is equipped with both solar panels and fuel cells,
each sufficient to avoid a catastrophe.
Traveling alongside the Hab is
a second ERA to support a
subsequent Human mission to Mars in
2016. Should the first MLV have any
trouble, the second will arrive with the
Hab and begin producing propellant
immediately. The second MLV will be
fully fueled by the time the crew is
Fig. 1.1.5 Two ERVs in orbit around Mars.
ready to leave. We also phase the
second ERV’s orbit to provide the crew with nearly constant communication while
on the surface (see Fig 1.1.5).
Upon arriving at Mars on July 4,
2014, the tether is cut and the Hab is
readied for aerocaputre. Because it hits
the atmosphere at a considerably higher
8.4km/s, we designed the Hab to generate
a significant amount of lift. The lift is used
to combat the high g-loads encountered on
the plunge into the atmosphere, thereby
Fig. 1.1.6 Hab aerocapture in
reducing stress on the crew and Martian atmosphere.

equipment (see Fig. 1.1.6).

After the Hab has sufficiently braked in
the Martian atmosphere, the nose faring is
jettisoned revealing landing legs and a retro-
rocket. Similar to the MLV descent, the Hab
is slowed to subsonic speeds with a series of
parachutes. Finally, it is guided, via the retro-
rockets, to a soft landing near the garage,

Figure 1.1.7 Hab landing near

MLV, and CTV (see Fig 1.1.7).
MLV/CTV Stack (N.Czapla).

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On the Surface
Unlike Apollo, the major motivation for this mission is science. With a
surface stay of 590 days the crew has ample time to conduct experiments and
explore the surrounding area. To augment the crew’s capability to explore, they
have been equipped with both a pressurized, long-range rover and an un-
pressurized, short-range rover. To facilitate research on several fronts, we also
included a greenhouse with the science equipment.
The Long Range Rover (LRR) runs off of the methanol and oxygen being
produced by the MLV. With the goal of
covering 10000km in the LRR, the crew
embarks on what will be the first of ten, long-
distance excursions (see Fig. 1.1.8). Each
excursion lasts fourteen days and is intended
to maximize the science return of the
mission.
Fig 1.1.8 LRR and crew on a long-
distance excursion (A. Spencer). With the help of the LRR, the scientists
cover nearly 800,000km2 over the course of
the mission. Equipped with the tools necessary to conduct numerous geological,
meteorological, and biochemical studies, the crew will spend roughly 75% of their
days engaged in scientific research.
While two of the crewmembers are out on long-range excursions, the
remainder of the crew will be occupied with research in or around the Hab.
Conducting agricultural experiments in
the spacious greenhouse (see
Fig.1.1.9), the crew can also analyze
the latest samples brought back from
the last LRR mission. While not
planning for the next long-range
excursion, the crew maintains the Hab

Fig. 1.1.9 Mars greenhouse (A. Spencer).

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and releases several balloons for atmospheric research and site scouting (see
Fig. 1.1.10).
If the LRR runs into any trouble, the Hab crew is outfitted with an
additional rover, the Short-Range
Rover (SRR), which can be used in
an emergency to quickly race out to
the stranded crewmembers. With a
max range of 1000km, equal to the
furthest, round-trip distance that the
LRR is ever likely to be away, the
SRR will also provide local
Fig. 1.1.10 Hab, SRR, and Mars Balloons
(N. Czapla). transportation for the crew at the Hab.
As the time on Mars draws to a close,
the crew prepares the MLV and CTV for launch back to Earth.

The Trip Back Home

On, December 26, 2015 the crew boards the CTV in preparation for the
trip back to Earth. The CTV is has little room for more than four crewmembers
and samples to return to Earth. The fully fueled MLV slowly lifts off the surface of
Mars. It is headed for low-Mars orbit where it
will rendezvous with the waiting ERV (see Fig.
1.1.11). The crew then transfers from the CTV
into the ERV, their home for the next 230 days.
Soon afterwards, the MLV is fired again
to place the ERV/CTV assembly on a trans-
Earth injection. At the completion of the burn, Fig. 1.1.11 MLV/CTV mate with
orbiting ERV.
the ERV/CTV assembly undocks from the now
spent MLV. The ERV/CTV quickly turn around and re-dock with the MLV, this
proven maneuver is to allow the MLV to be tethered to the ERV and CTV for the
trip home.

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 The assembly is spun up in a manner
identical to the Hab spin-up. At the
completion of the initial spin-up, a
kilometer-long tether is deployed
between the ERV/CTV assembly and the
MLV (see Fig. 1.1.12). At the beginning
of the transit, the crew experiences the

Fig. 1.1.12 ERV and CTV tethered to MLV same .38g’s that they have become well
for return trip.
accustomed to however, over the course
of a month, the vehicles are gently spun-up to Earth’s gravitational conditions.
Arriving at Earth on August 12, 2016, the crew severs the tether in
preparation for the landing sequence. As the crew gets closer to Earth, it
transfers back into the CTV. Just as the
assembly nears, the CTV un-docks from the
ERV (see Fig. 1.1.13). Sweeping violently
through the Earth’s atmosphere, at 11.8
km/s the lifting body CTV aerocaputres into
Earth orbit. The mission comes to and end
as the crew deorbits the CTV. Landing
Fig 1.1.13 CTV returns crew to Earth.
under parachutes, the CTV glides to a rough
but safe landing.

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