by Cliff Roehr
“(Alpha Centauri (R Cen / R Centauri) is the brightest star system in the southern constellation of Centaurus. Although it appears as a single point to the naked eye, Alpha Centauri is actually a system of three stars, one of which is the fourth brightest star in the night sky. Alpha Centauri is famous in the Southern Hemisphere as the outermost "pointer" to the Southern Cross, but it is too far south to be visible in most of the northern hemisphere. The two brightest components of the system are too close to be resolved as separate stars by the naked eye and so are perceived as a single source of light with a total visual magnitude of about S0.27 (brighter than the third brightest star in the night sky, Arcturus).”
“Alpha Centauri is the closest star system outside our own solar system, being 4.39 light-years distant, about 25.8 tril ion miles . Proxima Centauri, often regarded as part of the system, is 4.26 light-years distant. Alpha and Beta Centauri are the second closest pair of first magnitude stars as seen from the Earth, and due to the effects of proper motion, they wil become the closest pair around 2166, overtaking Acrux and Becrux”.
“There being no more questions this orientation is adjourned. Be sure to pick up your vitamins on the way out, also be sure to visit the gym for your workout, on the hour, at some point that fits your schedule during each 24 hour cycle.”
The orientation lasted just over an hour. “Wel said Carla I guess I should take my vitamins for star date whatever it is.” “No, you are supposed to take those after breakfast, remember, we should start tomorrow.” After their workout and a lite dinner they returned to their room. By this time they had forgotten all about needing a nap, besides they would have to go to bed early if Carla was to be in the kitchen at 0400 to begin training.
“Training, that is a laugh, why don't they just call it what it is KP duty?”
“Oh, wel , Carla I might luck out and they may teach me how to nail 2x4's together.” They had intended to check out the coffee bar and day room but opted to watch a movie on TV, then turn in for the night. They found that could just select “Movie” on their remote control then a list of over three hundred movies were available, Including the latest releases that were just now reaching the box office. It didn't matter which movie they selected, they fell asleep almost as soon as it started.
July 8, 2107: Carla was kind of amazed when she arrived at the kitchen the next morning. She was directed to a classroom adjacent to the kitchen where she could watch what was going on in the kitchen through a large window. Within five minutes the room attracted twelve other students who began to get acquainted with one another. This was important to her because she knew that these were the people she would be working with for the next ten years of her life. Carla introduced herself to a couple of the others but mostly just listened as one after the other talked about their backgrounds in food service and how they had come to be here. She caught a few names but didn't concentrate on doing so because she would know each of them very well in due time.
About 0410 a man in cooks whites entered the room, he was a medium built man of about 40 “Good Morning Students, my name is Don Morino. I am a member of the ships crew not a member of the kitchen staff. My job is to provide you with the necessary instruction to enable you to hit the ground running when you arrive at your duty station.” The first thing he did was to introduce one of the students as their new mess boss. The woman's name was Hilda Gorman, she would be in charge of the kitchen operation for the employees of Mars Colony, Inc. “Hilda wil during this voyage select four of you to be head cooks. She wil also select three crews of three cooks each from the rest of you. So Hilda would you like to address your crew before we get started?” “I don't have much to say at this time but the other students should know that for the last nine years I have been employed in the kitchen of a major hospital. I am married. My husband has also been hired by The Company because of his background as a hydrological engineer for mining operations throughout the Northeast. We obviously have no children or we wouldn't be here. I have a BA degree as a dietitian from Arver college. I went to work for Central State Hospital in Trenton right out of college. I worked my way up from the bottom. When I left to take this job, I was in charge of the entire food service program of the hospital. I am pretty well qualified to have the position that I hold and I hope that I can adapt to the conditions we find on Mars, I hope we all can.”
When Hilda sat down Don continued “I guess I owe you an apology, you are going to have some problems when you first arrive on station. Your kitchen and dining room is in the hold of this ship, it wil have to be installed after you arrive. Until then you will be using an army field kitchen that is also in the hold of this ship but can be set up quickly. I am having the field kitchen brought up here one piece at a time so I can teach you how to use each item to feed three hundred hungry people. Your refrigerator and freezer space will be shared with the Government kitchen that is presently operating. Their mess officer has agreed to accommodate you to the best of his ability but expect some problems as they don't have that much refrigeration space to spare. You will have to serve a lot of canned and dehydrated food until your facilities are functioning.”
“The on board food service crew is operating short handed because they wil expect you people to help them with serving and kitchen clean-up for every meal until we arrive at Mars Station. With that Don lead them to an adjoining locker room. Please give my assistant your size. She will issue you a set of whites which you should put on as soon as you receive them. There are dressing rooms in the rear of the locker room. Your lockers already have your name on them. My assistant wil provide you with the combination to your locker. Once you are satisfied that the whites are the right size go up and draw two more sets. Put them, along with your regular clothes, into your locker. The whole crew shortly found themselves serving breakfast to the passengers. Once everyone had been served they fil ed their own trays and found a seat. Carla found Tim seated with Archibald Shrimp and two other men she didn't know. They introduced themselves quickly because they were already eating their breakfast. They had been served scrambled eggs, corned beef hash, biscuits and gravy and some sliced fresh fruit. “Enjoy your fresh fruit, once it is gone you probably won't see any fresh fruit for years to come,.”
said the man who had introduced himself as Jack Overmeyer. The clean up didn't take long and by the time Carla returned to the class room there was an assortment of cooking appliances at the front of the room. Don Morino spent the rest of the morning until lunch explaining the proper use of the equipment. It seemed to Carla that it wouldn't be half bad using this equipment on a temporary basis as everything seemed pretty well thought out. Lunch was pretty much a repeat of the breakfast scene. After the cleanup they were given the afternoon off but told to show up to serve dinner and help with the clean up again. For the rest of the journey Carla pretty much followed the same routine. Classes covered al the basic kitchen and cooking skil s, food preservation, sanitation and everything else that most of them were already quite familiar with. There were a few new things to be aware of, mostly those concerned becoming accustomed to cooking in low gravity. They didn't seem particularly complicated, just different, they were techniques that would come naturally after a few days. Carla found for example that two women could easily carry a 20 gal on pot of liquid that would weigh about 180 lbs on Earth but on Mars would only weigh only thirty five percent of that much or about 56 lbs. If you flipped eggs in a pan to turn them over they might soar to five feet before they started their decent and then they probably wouldn't come down in the pan. Until their kitchen was completed on Mars they would be getting their water in five gallon jugs but not a problem she could lift one easily by herself, it would weigh 40 lbs on Earth but only weighed 14 lbs on Mars. There were lots of other things like that.
She chose the early afternoon to go to the gym. The exercises were about what she had expected but they seemed a little easier to do. Gravity was stil at 85% on the ship.
Tim's training started after br
eakfast. Tim had an hour or so before he had to report to start his training. He found the right room and arrived about five minutes before 0730. There were over two hundred people in the room when the instructor arrived promptly at 0730. He was dressed from head to foot in a Mars Suit. There was a microphone in the helmet and a speaker that amplified his words. There was also a speaker for each ear. His hearing was very sensitive while wearing the suit. He told them that if turned his volume up to max he could hear a pin drop one hundred yards away. He spent the next hour explaining the features of the Mars suit as he removed parts of it from his person. This suit is unlike a space suit in a number of ways, he told them because a space suit was designed to wear in a weightless environment, whereas the Mars suit was designed to protect the wearer from the cold, the UV
rays and from the atmosphere of Mars. The boots were different and the fabric was much tougher and harder to penetrate because the wearer would be doing hard physical labor while wearing the suit. The suit air sealed around the neck so even if the suit were compromised the helmet would remain intact and the wearer might have time to patch the hole.
Humans working on the surface of the planet always work in pairs. We always send two people to do one persons job. The iron rule of survival on the surface is NEVER GO OUTSIDE ALONE. not for any reason, under any circumstance ever. There are no exceptions to that rule.
“My name is Ashton Thompson, I am the head instructor for the Company. I wil not be going to the planet with you but I was a Captain with the Army Corps of Engineers that constructed the first habitat on Mars I have spent more time on the surface of the planet than almost anyone else. The other instructors were also there with the Corps. You should pay very close attention to everything they teach you because it is your life that depends on it.”
“You will only be asked or allowed to work on the surface for an hour at a time. That does not Include working in the caverns that have yet to be pressurized where you can work up to four hours at a time while wearing the Mars suit. The caverns on Mars are ful of fissures that lead to the surface. Until al of the fissures have been sealed and the cavern pressurized you must work in a Mars suit. Once the cavern has been pressurized and heated and atmosphere introduced you can work in an ordinary jump suit. “
“Most of the work you will be doing in addition to what I have just described is leveling the floors and building the mil ion and one things that people need to carry on their lives. Your present priorities wil be to finish setting up The Company cavern to accommodate the three hundred people that The Company is sending on this ship. The cavern has already been sealed and pressurized and the floor leveled but your first two priorities must be to complete the dining room and kitchen and to complete instil ation of the bathroom facilities. Installation of the thermo electric generator for power and the reverse osmoses system for water purification are items that are also very high on the list of priorities.”
The the thermo electric generator equipment for that project is on board this ship. It is essential that we obtain our power and heat from some source other than diesel generators.” The sooner accomplish these high priority objectives the more comfortable you wil be and the happier the Company will be.“
“Once these things are completed then you wil be sealing a large cavern that we have found that is withing tunneling distance from the cavern that The Company wil be occupying. Once that cavern is completed and powered by geothermal energy The Company wil be sending in 3,000 more employees to complete the main cavern which is about the size of the State of Rode Island. Mars Colony, Inc and the Unites States Government are very aggressive in pursuit of the goal of occupying the large cavern.
In anticipation of taming that large cavern the company figures they wil need three thousand more employees. Since we are only capable of transporting about one thousand two hundred workers per year every flight from now on wil be loaded to capacity. Once the large cavern is completed and settlers begin to arrive more and larger ships wil be required to keep them supplied. Two more space craft are presently under construction. One which wil be dubbed Mars Runner is twice as large and twice as fast as this ship. The other ship, yet unnamed wil be ten times the size of this ship. It wil be capable of speeds greater than the speed of light. It could be capable of journeys beyond the solar system into deep space.
Al of the work on Mars wil never be done just as al the work on Earth wil never be done but once the large cavern is finished and populated you can expect to see cities with business and shopping mal s just as you see now on Earth. Land wil be bought and sold just as on Earth. There will be an independent Government elected by the people. Mars wil be a ful y functioning planet.” Since this is all being done by the United States the new settlements wil be a part of the United States.
“That in a nutshell is our plan and your mission.” Our goal beyond my lifetime is to convert the atmosphere of Mars to be more Earth like which would involve rotating the planet faster which would Increase the gravity and enable the planet to retain an atmosphere which we could introduce. At that future time we would have to figure out how to produce an ozone layer on Mars that would shield the surface from deadly radiation. Perhaps a friendly atmosphere would generate it's own ozone layer. We know that those things are possible but it wil probably be another hundred years or more before they are realized. One thing for certain once this planet is colonized with the technology that we now have the scientists wil be working hard to solve those bigger problems.
“We have prepared sixty lessons and have allowed six to eight hours for each lesson. You will be broken up into fifteen groups of eleven or twelve students in each group and wil take one lesson per day. The lessons all have to do with using the equipment, how to do the necessary jobs, safety and the like. We have 15 instructors so by the time you reach Mars you should pretty much know what to do and how to do it no matter what your previous background has been. Most of you have a few years experience in the building trades and that wil be a desirable background to build on. It is just that on Mars you will be using different materials and different tools. We have posted your names on the cork board at the back of the room. There are 20 copies for each team so take a copy of the one for your team. It wil tell you what room to report to and what time to be there for the entire course.”
“You may have the rest of the day off to get acquainted with each other, you will be working together for a long time, explore the part of the ship where you have authorization and to set aside one hour for exercising in the gym.”
“Incidentally, if you didn't know there is a restaurant that serves a first class dinner with two drinks or two glasses of wine. You can order anything you want from the menu, they are open from 1700 to 2200 every evening. The food and service are the very best. The restaurant is run by a contract vendor. The price is a little steep by Earth standards, $200.00 per person but that covers everything, even the gratuity. You wil find the restaurant behind an unmarked door in room 888. Reservations are required, just ask your room steward to set them up for you. You wil not be allowed to eat there more than once a week. You may pay by sliding your ID card and the price will be deducted from your next pay check. You might want to have one more meal in a top notch restaurant before you disembark. This wil probably be your last opportunity for ten years.”
There was an extended question and answer period but the meeting let out by 1000 hours. Tim found his name on the list for group 11. He was pleased to see the name Archibald Shrimp on the same list. It was easy to find Archy, then together they watched for others taking a copy of list 11. They coat tailed five of them. Someone suggested they go to the coffee shop and get acquainted. The coffee shop served all beverages for one dol ar except the special coffee's which were $5.00. Once again you could slide your ID card and have the amount deducted from wages. As it turned out the coffee shop was run by the same company that ran the restaurant.
There was one girl in the group but the other six were all guys. The girl was bla
ck and that didn't make Archy unhappy at all. She turned out to be Gladys Hayes and was a high rise construction worker from New York City, yes a beam walker. Albert Gonzalez was a tile layer from Albuquerque, John Prince, had worked for a paving contractor in Spokane, Alan Nagoyuk, had worked as a construction foreman in Fairbanks. All but John took a dollar cup of coffee, John opted for a cafe-lata for $5.00, “What the hell, I am going to be a mil ionaire,” he said. They found a large round table and began to tell each other their life stories.
Albert said that aside from his job laying tile his hobby had been cave exploration, he had been a Speleological Society member for eight years and had explored caves al over North America. “My friends of course refer to me as the cave man.”
Alan said that he had been a member of the Alaska, National Guard and had instructed survivalist training in the guard.
John Prince said “I started playing baseball in little league and have played all my life, I even made a minor league roster for a year before I figured out that I just did not have what it takes to make it in the majors so I just play baseball now as a hobby.” Tim noted “You won't be playing any baseball on Mars, I'm afraid because baseball won't work there, a pitcher could throw a baseball hard enough to kil a man on Mars and a sharp line drive could also be lethal, a man just can't handle a baseball coming at him three hundred miles per hour. Also worthy of mention here is that football, basketball and soccer won't work on Mars either. A quarterback could pass a ball two hundred yards and could throw it hard enough to kil his receiver. Basketball might sort of work but everyone in the game could shoot from anywhere on the court with ease but probably could only make a slam dunk because the ball would go awry. Dribbling wouldn't work very wel either nor would passing. Soccer, hockey, all Earth sports are out on Mars, tennis, that's out too, the projectile just moves too fast and has lethal potential with every play. We are just going to have to invent new sports, maybe using oversize Nerf balls.” “I never thought of it that way but I guess you are right, we wil just have to invent our own new sports and start from scratch.” said Archy. “Cave exploration and arctic survival could be useful skil s though.”