Dust Storms And Boiling Blood: What Life On Mars Will Actually Be Like For Early Settlers

Mars is often seen as the would-be second home to humanity for a lot of reasons -- so much so that there is no dearth of volunteers who would like to be among the first waves of settlers on Mars colonies if the cost factor was to be waived off.

However, unlike the popular misconception, Mars is an incredibly hostile place that would kill off anyone at the very first chance it gets, says Kevin Nolan, lecturer at the Tallaght Institute of Technology and the author of Mars: A Cosmic Stepping Stone.

According to Nolan, it is entirely unclear how a human colonization of Mars could become a reality anytime soon, Irish Times reports. Interestingly, this confusion persists even at a time when celebrity entrepreneur and innovator Elon Musk is planning to establish colonies comprising 1 million people on Mars within the next 50 to 100 years.

"As challenging as it is to get a human-rated vehicle to the surface of Mars, it is nothing compared to the challenge of developing on-surface habitats," said Nolan.

According to University of Washington, the challenges are rather herculean. For example, the average temperature on the Red Planet is estimated to be -55 degrees with the surface temperature reaching nearly 20 degrees at the equator and -150 degrees at the poles. That is way off compared to the average temperature on Earth at 16 degrees.

Not just that, Mars also has a much thinner atmosphere than that on Earth. The atmospheric pressure on anyone standing on Mars without protective gears would be so low that their blood will start boiling within the metaphoric blink of an eye.

"Mars's atmosphere is only 1 per cent as dense as the Earth's, and unless terraformed, likely taking hundreds of years, all human habitats on Mars will be in enclosures," Nolan said.

Also, because the atmosphere is too thin to maintain a stable temperature, the settlers in the Mars colonies will have to always on the lookout for strong winds that can prove potentially catastrophic. The strong winds can raise the red dust on the surface, making them suspend in the atmosphere for a long period of time. This essentially means Mars can be a really dusty place during these storms.

"This can have a devastating effect on solar power, and indeed on all operations on the planet," Nolan mentioned. "NASA sees dust management as among the toughest challenges for human missions to the surface."

"These dust storms arise frequently and can cover huge regions of the planet for months or years on end."

The dead soil on the planet, meanwhile, is another massive challenge that the early settlers will have to face while trying to grow plants and crops on the planet.