Courage beyond words

The Dallas Morning News: It’s good, in times like these, to be reminded of the human spirit - of its capacity for wonder and courage.

What seems impossible, what seems ever out of reach, is exactly what we seem most driven to get, to explore, to know.

Mars, on average, is 140 million miles from Earth. A trip there would take a good part of a year, assuming speeds in the range of 35,000 mph.

Once there, a person is faced with a “hostile” environment, to borrow the word of the nonprofit organization Mars One. Deadly is more accurate. The atmosphere is some 95 percent carbon dioxide. The average temperature is 80 degrees below zero.

When Mars One announced it wanted to establish a colony on the Red Planet, it minced no words about the challenges of the journey.

“Mars is an unforgiving environment where a small mistake or accident can result in large failure, injury and death,” the group’s website tells us. “Every component must work perfectly. Every system (and its backup) must function without fail or human life is at risk.”

Applicants

More than 200,000 people immediately applied to go.

That number has been whittled to 100 candidates. Those in the final selection of a handful of colonists will undergo years of training before a planned launch in 2024.

There is an important catch. If they go, they cannot return.

According to Mars One’s website, the technology isn’t yet available to get colonists back from Mars.