Should the first person on Mars be a woman?
In an interview with BBC Radio 5 Live, Allison McIntyre, a senior NASA engineer at the Johnson Space Center in Houston said that the first person to set foot on Mars should be a woman.
“My centre director is a woman, my former division chief is a woman, we have female astronauts, but we haven't put a woman on the moon yet,” she said.
“I think the first person on Mars should be a woman,” she continued.
NASA sent the first woman into space over 40 years ago, but even so, space exploration remains a field largely dominated by men.
Do you think a woman should be the first person to set foot on Mars?
Wouldn't you know it, woman has already been there ... LOL
https://www.express.co.uk/news/weird/729312/MARS-SHOCK-Is-this-a-woman-s-body-spotted-on-Red-Planet
Tib
I am definitely not going if you are not coming with me
... need to have a protector
Considering it was a woman who helped put the first man on the moon and bring him back, I think it is more than fitting that a woman be the first to set foot on Mars.
https://www.wired.com/2015/10/margaret-hamilton-nasa-apollo/
Here she is after so many years finally being recognised by Obama.
New medical research has revealed that the mental and physical characteristics of women mean they are far better suited to long-term space travel than men. From what I have read,NASA is thinking along these lines and are considering an all-female cosmonaut crew on the first mission to put humans on Mars.
New research in the Journal Mens Health and Gender, focused on the hormonal and physical make-up of women under 30 years of age, and concludes that they are far better suited to long-term, long-distance travel than men. In particular, men in their thirties and forties are much more likely to develop the first signs of heart disease, a condition exacerbated by space travel. Women are protected from this by their comparatively high levels of oestrogen.
Heart attacks on space travel can prove problematic as drug treatments during space flight are not recommended since they are not readily absorbed in weightless conditions, the liver and the kidneys do not function at their best and the drug compounds deteriorate more quickly owing to the higher levels of radiation experienced in space. Men are also disadvantaged because they retain much higher levels of iron in the body than women, particularly in space, and this can reach toxic levels. Women’s reduced body mass, which requires fewer calories and produces less waste, also makes them yet more suitable as long-term astronauts.
It doesn’t matter if it is a male or female who is the first, this is not about sex discrimination. What matters is the one whose physiology can cope more readily with the task ahead.
Only this weekend my husband and I were discussing this very topic!
I’m surprised at this astronaut..surely she must know the real reason why more women are not being considered for this project. Although space technology is advancing in leaps and bounds..women are still more vulnerable than men biologically when it comes to dealing with cosmic radiation which is far more dangerous than solar radiation. Mars is a long way from earth and the radiation an astronaut will be exposed to is incredibly high..much much higher than the radiation closer to Earth.
I’m told that for now although all astronauts irrespective of sex are equally vulnerable to radiation..female astronauts are more liable to suffer because of cancer risks from breast..ovarian and uterine cancers. So it would seem at the present time..women are indeed not as suited as men for space exploration as far flung as Mars..that is not to say it won’t change in the future..according to scientists..
I think McIntyre's "complaint" is coming from a “feminist” point of view and speaking personally as a “non-feminist”..this notion of allowing women to be the first person to do this or that or to step on Mars is condescending. Women don’t require concessions made for them. The sex more suitable for the journey should be chosen...