News & Announcements

MDRS Crew 176 – Final Mission Report The following is the final summary report of Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) Crew 176, the Polish team “PolMars.” A full review of this year’s activities at MDRS will be presented at the 20th Annual International Mars Society Convention, scheduled for September 7-10, 2017 at University of California Irvine. MDRS Mission Summary Crew 176 (PolMars) was the first entirely Polish crew at MDRS. Our simulation took place between 11-26 March 2017. Except for one… READ MORE >

The most competitive Critical Design Review in University Rover Challenge (URC) history has concluded with 36 student teams from seven countries being selected to compete June 1-3 at the Mars Society’s Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) in southern Utah. A record 82 teams from 13 countries began the year trying to design and build the world’s best astronaut-assisting Mars rover. With most teams presenting highly advanced systems, judges were left with an incredibly difficult decision and ultimately decided to expand… READ MORE >

The 2017 Mars Society Poster Contest kicks off today. Members, friends and space enthusiasts are all invited to submit a poster for consideration, with the winning design to be used as the main promotional graphic for the 20th Annual International Mars Society Convention, scheduled for September 7-10, at the University of California Irvine. Those intending to create a poster for the annual competition are asked to incorporate the main theme of this year’s 20th anniversary convention – “From Imagination to… READ MORE >

The Mars Society is sponsoring a Student Mars Art (SMArt) Contest, inviting youth from around the world to depict the human future on the planet Mars. Young artists from grades 4 through 12 (ages 8 to 18) are invited to submit up to three works of art each, illustrating any part of the human future on the Red Planet, including the first landing, human field exploration, operations at an early Mars base, the building of the first Martian cities, terraforming… READ MORE >

The Mars Society will be marking an important milestone this year with the convening of its 20th Annual International Mars Society Convention on the campus of the University of California Irvine, scheduled for September 7-10, 2017. The four-day international conference will bring together leading scientists, engineers, policymakers, government officials, aerospace industry representatives, policymakers and journalists to talk about the latest scientific discoveries, technological advances and political-economic developments that could help pave the way for the human exploration and settlement of… READ MORE >

MOJAVE, CA – Student-built rockets will streak into the stratosphere in Spring 2018 as college and university engineering teams from around the world compete for $100,000 in prizes in a contest sponsored jointly by the Mars Society, headquartered in Lakewood, CO and the California-based Friends of Amateur Rocketry (FAR). Announced last year, the FAR-MARS Prize will grant $50,000 to the team whose bi-propellant liquid-fueled rocket comes closest to reaching 45,000 feet (13,716 meters). A second $50,000 prize will go to the… READ MORE >

Mars Is Within Reach By Dr. Robert Zubrin, American Thinker, 12.27.16 On November 28, a syndicated op-ed by Charles Wohlforth and Amanda Hendrix appeared in the Los Angeles Times and carried over the following days by a number of other newspapers claiming that journeys to Mars are just a dream. According to these writers, the race to Mars “can’t be won with either’s [NASA’s or SpaceX’s] current technology, regardless of their spending or commitment. The barrier is human biology. Even a… READ MORE >

Facebook/NatGeo Launch Live 360 Video from MDRS in Utah On Tuesday, December 13 at 12:00 pm PDT / 3:00 pm EDT, Facebook is launching Live 360 video with National Geographic, live from the Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) facility in Utah. People around the world will be able to discover and explore this video on Facebook. Over the past 80 days, seven space scientists from around the world have lived in pods simulating every aspect of life on Mars, including total isolation… READ MORE >

This report submitted by Alexandre Mangeot, Crew Commander. For these 60-day reports I asked my crew mates to write about this mission from their personal perspectives. I wanted us to share more than the pictures, the science and technology reports and food recipes. I wanted us to share our feelings as much as it is humanly possible with simple words! So the crew wrote their parts independently during these few days and the result is just mind-blowing… Read the report… READ MORE >

On November 29th, the Mars Society will be participating in #GivingTuesday, a global day dedicated to philanthropic giving driven by social media and collaboration. It’s a day when your financial support for our non-profit organization makes a huge impact and allows us to actively pursue our goal of human Mars exploration. With your help and involvement, the Mars Society is carrying out important Mars surface simulation work at its stations in Utah and Canada, playing a major role in educational… READ MORE >

By Robert Zubrin, National Review, 11.12.16 In 1955, Werner von Braun teamed up with Walt Disney to produce a three-part TV series laying out America’s spacefaring future. With a record-smashing viewership of 40 million people for its first episode, “Man in Space” played a decisive role in putting the challenge of sending men to the Moon squarely in the mind of the nation. Just 14 years later, we were there. Now, with the soon-to-start six-part National Geographic TV series Mars,… READ MORE >

By Annalea Beattie, Mars 160 Crew Member, Space.com, 11.11.16 The Mars Society is conducting the ambitious two-phase Mars 160 Twin Desert-Arctic Analog mission to study how seven crew members could live, work and perform science on a true mission to Mars. Mars 160 crew member Annalea Beattie is chronicling the mission, which will spend 80 days at the Mars Desert Research Station in southern Utah desert before venturing far north to Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station on Devon Island, Canada… READ MORE >

The Mars Society published today on its web site the full set of rules for its new American Mars Exploration Rover Challenge (AMERC), a high school version of the organization’s highly successful University Rover Challenge, part of the Rover Challenge Series (RCS) which is intended to inspire students at the crossroad of robotics and space exploration. The inaugural AMERC competition will take place at an artificial Mars Yard to be built at The Wings over the Rockies Air & Space… READ MORE >

By Annalea Beattie, Mars 160 Crew Member, Space.com, 10.28.16 The Mars Society is conducting an ambitious two-phase Mars 160 Twin Desert-Arctic Analog mission to study how seven crewmembers could live, work and perform science on a true mission to Mars. Mars 160 crewmember Annalea Beattie ischronicling the mission, which will spend 80 days at the Mars Desert Research Station in southern Utah desert before venturing far north to Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station on Devon Island, Canada in summer 2017. Here’s her fourth dispatch from… READ MORE >

By Robert Zubrin, The New Atlantis, 10.21.16 In remarks at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico on September 29, 2016, SpaceX president Elon Musk revealed to great fanfare his company’s plans for an Interplanetary Transport System (ITS). According to Musk, the ITS would enable the colonization of Mars by the rapid delivery of a million people in groups of a hundred passengers per flight, as well as large-scale human exploration missions to other bodies, such as Jupiter’s moon Europa…. READ MORE >

Please help promote Mars and space exploration during the 2017 Space Exploration Alliance Legislative Blitz on Capitol Hill early next year, scheduled for February 26-28. SEA staff will hold an information/training session for attendees in Washington, D.C. on the afternoon of Sunday, February 26th (2 p.m. to 5 p.m.). Meetings with congressional offices will be held on Monday, February 27th and Tuesday, February 28th. Join other Mars Society members and friends by signing up today!… READ MORE >

At its international convention in Washington, D.C. on September 24th, the Mars Society announced that it will conduct an annual high school Mars rover competition. The contest, to be known as the American Mars Exploration Rover Challenge (AMERC), builds on the organization’s highly successful Mars rover competitions for university teams, including the University Rover Challenge (URC), held in Utah at the Mars Desert Research Station, and the European Rover Challenge (ERC), conducted on simulated desert terrain (“Mars yard”) at a science… READ MORE >

Today, President Obama called for sending humans to Mars. Let’s hope that his successor acts to make that vision a reality.To be serious, the next president needs to make the goal to be to get to the Red Planet before the end of her or his second term. This can be done. From a technical point of view, we are much closer today to sending humans to Mars they we were to sending men to the Moon in 1961, and… READ MORE >

The first of a regular weekly journal series, exclusive to Space.com, from the Mars Society’s Mars 160 crew currently stationed at the Mars Desert Research Station in Utah. By Annalea Beattie, Mars 160 Crew Member On Sept. 24, The Mars Society launched the ambitious two-phase Mars 160 Twin Desert-Arctic Analog simulation to study how seven crewmembers could live, work and perform science on a true mission to Mars. Mars 160 crewmember Annalea Beattie is chronicling the mission, which will spend 80 days at… READ MORE >

New spacesuits, helmets and backpacks were delivered earlier today to the Mars Society’s Mars Desert Research Station. As expected, our Mars 160 crew members are very pleased with the new gear. A big thanks to our Mars Society NorCal chapter for designing and creating the new spacesuits, and our sincere appreciation to an anonymous donor for providing funding for the badly-needed upgrades…. READ MORE >

Mars Society President Dr. Robert Zubrin will be interviewed on Public Radio International’s Science Friday program this Friday, October 7th, 3:40-4:00 pm EDT (1:40-2:00 pm MDT), to talk about current planning for humans-to-Mars, Elon Musk’s recent announcement and the Mars Society’s Mars 160 simulation mission. Please tune in this Friday at the PRI web site: http://www.sciencefriday.com…. READ MORE >

A group of students – Team Cranspace – from Cranfield University, a public school in England, won 1st place in the International Gemini Mars Design Competition, with the final round of the contest held last weekend at the 2016 International Mars Society Convention in Washington, D.C. Initiated by the Mars Society in August 2015, the Gemini Mars competition invited engineering students from around the world to design and plan a two-person Mars flyby mission that could be placed on the… READ MORE >

In his talk today, Musk presented a number of interesting and very useful ideas. I don’t think they are practical in the form he presented them, but with a little modification, they could be made practical and very powerful. He’s right on the mark about using methane/oxygen propellant, which can be made on Mars; about making the spacecraft reusable and refillable on orbit. The key thing I would change is his plan to send the whole trans Mars propulsion system… READ MORE >