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Comment by gwern | Hacker News Reader

Yeah; just for starters, such a sandy area seems like a serious risk on its own to a rover, never mind the risk actual geysers would pose. The geysers are interesting, but are they worth jeopardizing an entire rover expedition for?

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You don't have to use a rover. What about a quadcopter or balloon filled with heated gas?

Good luck.. the highest atmospheric density on Mars is equal to the density found 35 km above the Earth's surface

I think a latex balloon filled with hydrogen could achieve positive buoyancy. Just bring a little bit of water and you can make your own hydrogen.

I don't know of many latexes that are springy at -100 C.

It wouldn't have to be latex. What's wrong with mylar?

Touché. See Camper Bob's response for something that would make more sense.

There is, to a first approximation, no atmosphere on Mars. To a slightly better approximation, there is an atmosphere on Mars, but only enough to cause trouble, not enough to actually be useful for anything.

There's enough atmosphere for Nasa to seriously consider deploying airplanes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_aircraft

We've had the discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4261806

A cessna would need wings as large as a 747 and be traveling about mach 1 to take off, iirc.

Thats an awesome metaphor! Going to use this one, thanks.

Mach 1 where?

On Mars. Mach, the speed of sound (vibrations), varies with changes in heat, density, etc.

Mach 1 always means the speed of sound in the local environment.

So it would need wings that have ten? times more surface... that doesn't mean this couldn't be done using small scale drone designs.

On the other hand, the loss of a rover to one of these plumes could itself provide interesting information: It would conclusively prove that they occur explosively, and if we can photograph the rover afterwards then the displacement of an object with known mass would let us gauge the amount of force these things exert.

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