COMMENT S'ADAPTER À LA LUNE ET S'Y IMPLANTER

 

(Source: LecturaPress)

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(Texte basée sur des twits publiés ces dernières semaines.)

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Les pilotes d'avion civil doivent utiliser des simulateurs de vol avant de prendre les commandes d'un vrai avion de ligne. Et si d'éventuels futurs colons lunaires étaient astreints à faire quelque chose d'assez semblable, histoire de s'habituer à une gravité lunaire très faible?

Pour être réaliste, il faudrait alors bâtir des centrifugeuses capables de simuler la gravité lunaire. Il faudrait qu'elles soient en orbite, puisque la gravité lunaire est bien moindre que la gravité terrestre, d'environ six fois, et qu'une centrifugeuse bâtie sur Terra, en toute logique, ne pourrait simuler qu'une gravité plus forte que la gravité terrestre. Il faudrait aussi des engins assez grands pour permettre la reproduction des étapes d'une vie normale: dormir, se lever, se laver, manger, boire, travailler, se distraire, etc.

Pour permettre une adaptation graduelle et adéquate du corps humain, le séjour en centrifugeuse devrait être proportionnel à la durée prévue du séjour lunaire. On présume ici, que la présence humaine sur la Lune serait transitoire, à la façon des bases antarctiques, dont le personnel varie selon la saison, estivale et hivernale. Du coup, cela implique des calculs faisant intervenir la vitesse de rotation et la longueur de la centrifugeuse, entre son centre et chaque extrémité.

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Considering recent announcements about potential dangerosity of long-term exposure to solar radiation, especially between the Earth and Mars, and over longer distances, of course, it is thus possible that the only human settlement possible outside Terra may be on the surface of the Moon.

Such an installation would need many different sites. Il would need a sort of landing pad, for the coming and going of manned rockets (or unmanned ones, for supplies), and a rescue rocket ready to be use in case of an emergency. Such a site implies auxiliary uses: a receiving area (for personnel), a repair area (for matériel), a storage area (for fuels, merchandises, etc.).

There will have to be a living site, with warehousing space, food production area (hothouses, aquaculture, etc.), food transformation area, sleeping area, recreation area, etc. The work area will be the center of activities, and the raison d'être of the whole thing. It may be dedicated to the operation of A) a telescope for long range observation, B) a center for research about the possible uses of lunar material: regolith, minerals, gases, ice water, C) an energy facility, with electrical equipment, transformation stations, transmission cables, outside fields made up of mounted solar mirrors, etc., to give just a few examples. Additionally, other areas, more oriented on technical support, would have to be set up for electrical systems, heating systems, ventilation systems, oxygen storage or production, etc.

Around that basic, core installation, other uses would be possible as kind of sub-bases: tourist hotel, lunaport (for tours in flying lunacraft), long-term storage, fuel depot, administrative offices, industrial facilities, etc.

All those things are possible, over a period of 20, 30, 40 years. It may be the work of a few single space agencies, working more or less independently, or (far more likely) of a few consortiums, each comprising many space agencies working together.

Conceivably, given geopolitical realities, one such consortium may take the form of an association of the space agencies financed by the United States, Canada, the European Union, Japan, etc. Another may group the space agencies of the likes of Russia, China, Iran, Brazil, etc. Some countries may have to make a choice between those consortiums, go their own way, or divide their efforts, like India, for instance.

And there all the private agencies that can be expected to do the bidding of their respective countries of origine. It is quite possible that, given time, some corporations may grow enough to be able to create and operate their own bases, the way the British East India Company, the Hudson Bay Company, la Compagnie des Cent-Associés, la Compagnie du Nord-Ouest, or the Dutch East India Company, to give but a few examples, were able to build empires of their own, in the not so distant past...

https://scitechdaily.com/wired-to-explore-nasas-45-mile-long-nervous-system-for-roman-space-telescope/

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PLUS:  @charles.millar3 (Twitter)