Colonization of Mars - Conditions For Human Habitation

Conditions For Human Habitation

Conditions on the surface of Mars are much closer to the conditions of Earth of any other known planet or moon, as seen by the extremely hot and cold temperatures on Mercury, the furnace-hot surface of Venus, or the cryogenic cold of the outer planets and their moons. Only the cloud tops of Venus are closer in terms of Earth-like temperature, atmospheric pressure and gravity than the surface of Mars. Humans have explored parts of the Earth which match some conditions on Mars. The highest altitude reached by a manned balloon ascent, a record set in May 1961, was 34,668 meters (113,740 feet). (As of October 14, 2012 this record has been surpassed. Felix Baumgartner in Red Bull Stratos set the record for highest manned balloon flight of 128,176 feet (39,068m) near Roswell, New Mexico, USA.)The pressure at that altitude is about the same as on the surface of Mars. Extreme cold in the Arctic and Antarctic match all but the most extreme temperatures on Mars.

Read more about this topic:  Colonization Of Mars

Famous quotes containing the words conditions, human and/or habitation:

    Mankind always sets itself only such tasks as it can solve; since, looking at the matter more closely, we will always find that the task itself arises only when the material conditions necessary for its solution already exist or are at least in the process of formation.
    Karl Marx (1818–1883)

    Sinclair Lewis is the perfect example of the false sense of time of the newspaper world.... [ellipsis in source] He was always dominated by an artificial time when he wrote Main Street.... He did not create actual human beings at any time. That is what makes it newspaper. Sinclair Lewis is the typical newspaperman and everything he says is newspaper. The difference between a thinker and a newspaperman is that a thinker enters right into things, a newspaperman is superficial.
    Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)

    We have seen when the earth had to be prepared for the habitation of man, a veil, as it were, of intermediate being was spread between him and its darkness, in which were joined in a subdued measure, the stability and insensibilty of the earth, and the passion and perishing of mankind.
    John Ruskin (1819–1900)