Womanned mission to Venus

There is a lot of talk and research activity concerning a manned mission to Mars, which is supposed to happen eventually. The plan would of course be to send either men or a mixed crew to land on Mars, spend some time there and return to Earth. Mars symbolises masculinity, and going to Mars is therefore a "manly" thing to do.

This is probably quite a sexist thing to think, but it made me wonder what a "womanly" mission to another planet would be like, and besides the sexist overtones, actually it seems to make quite a lot of sense. Rather than trying to send men to land on Mars, why not send women to the upper atmosphere of Venus? Venus is closer than Mars and also easier to reach because it is closer to the sun and there is therefore less need to push against its gravity. I am aware that it isn't a question of travelling the thirty million odd kilometres between the orbit of the Earth and that of Venus, but nor is it a matter of crossing the sixty million odd kilometres between us and Mars. It's actually a lot further than that.

There are several clear advantages in sending women to Venus rather than men to Mars:

Women tend to be smaller and lighter than men. A woman with a body mass index of twenty and average American stature would weigh fifty-two kilogrammes and require twenty-two percent fewer calories than an average man of the same BMI. Moreover, the actual energy requirement could be lower because it would be easier to warm the environment to a temperature which would lead to lower energy consumption Less less fuel would be needed, the spacecraft can be slightly smaller, they wouldn't need as much oxygen, water or food and they would produce less faeces, urine and carbon dioxide, so the total biomass needed would be lower. There might be less conflict between a crew of women than a mixed or all-male one, although this could be me being prejudiced again.

Since the mission would be to Venus, more radiation would be available than towards Mars, making it easier to use solar power and also to support photosynthesis. Food would therefore be easier to grow and less energy would need to be generated on the spacecraft itself. At the orbit of Venus, the radiation of the sun would be ninety percent higher than the orbit of the Earth, and almost five times that at the orbit of Mars.

The flight would be shorter because Venus is both closer and its orbit is inside ours. This means that fewer resources are needed and that psychological problems would be less severe as well as physiological effects from weightlessness and radiation. It seems to take around six months to get to Mars and only four and a half to get to Venus. On reaching Venus, the crew would encounter a planet whose gravity is close to that of our planet's, giving them time to recuperate under near-normal gravitational conditions, whereas going to Mars would mean longer periods of weightlessness with an intermediate period of gravity far lower than ours. This also makes sense given the greater risk of osteoporosis arising from lower bone density. In this respect, men are more suited to going to Mars and women to going to Venus.

On reaching Venus, rather than landing, which would be impossible using today's technology, a plane could be launched into the upper atmosphere to cruise at an altitude where the temperature is comparable to that at the surface of the Earth, and the pressure would also be much lower than at ground level. The atmospheric pressure is at roughly one bar at a height of fifty kilometres, and is below boiling point at sea level from around forty-five kilometres up. If an airship were used, the fuel consumption would be very low. At the end of the period in the planet's atmosphere, the gas envelope could be discarded and the craft could fly higher until it eventually reached orbit and docked with the main ship. The design challenges for this sort of planetary mission would be lower than a Martian mission where the crew remained on the surface for a long time, since fewer consumables would need to be taken. It would also be less important for them to remain at the planet for as long because fewer resources and time would have been invested in the mission. Since the Venusian upper atmosphere takes four days to go round the planet, it would also be possible for a human crew to tour the entire planet passively, which would not be plausible on Mars. It is also much easier to fly in a dense atmosphere like that of Venus than a thin one like the Martian atmosphere.

The fact that the Venusian atmosphere is denser than the Martian one and contains sulphur compounds could also be an advantage. Rather than having to take all the raw materials needed with them, some could be gathered from the atmosphere itself. The carbon dioxide could be used by blue-green algae and the sulphur could eventually be used in amino acids after conversion.

Finally, communications would be easier because much of the time the ship would be closer to the rest of us than one on its way to Mars would be.

The next mission could be to send hermaphrodites to Mercury, which would be a really good idea for some reason.