What Firearms for Mars Exploration?

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scotjute

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While it probably several years down the road if ever, there is a chance that we could see a manned exploration trip to Mars.
If so what firearms if any would they carry?
Did the lunar astronauts carry any?
My initial guess would be something like a couple of slimmed down bare-bones .22WMR rifles with a 200-300 rounds of ammo. Some power, low weight, there's probably nothing there anyway.
 
I never heard of an astronaut carrying a firearm on a mission to the moon. A golf club yes.

No need for a firearm.

I don't think they will find a Mars like John Carter did in Edgar R. Burroughs novels.
 
Way too far fetched.........
Get your digs in boys and girls cuz' it wont be long before this one gets locked, just like the "firearms in the shower" thread did.....for being too far fetched...
 
What are you shooting? There are no bad guys. There is no game to eat. If there is....some entity bad enough it needs to be killed, how do you know it will be vulnerable to small arms, or projectile weapons at all?

By the time we get to Mars, we would probably be looking at energy beam weapons anyway.
 
You bring an Olympic-grade air pistol. No sense in losing your edge on a long trip...and you can set up some targets and hold the First Martian Olympic Games.
 
The only firearms in space I ever heard of where ones carried by the Soviet capsules.

They land in Siberia where a large carnivore might eat them before they get picked up, so they need a survival gun.

Anyway, the Martians all have force-field shields around them so firearms would not be effective in the least.

rc
 
You really think there's something to shoot on Mars, even after the Explorer has been there beaming back pictures for so long?
 
Something flat-shooting, just so I could try and shoot ultra-long-range in the low gravity.
And a .22, for target shooting.
 
I don't think this is a far fetched question. Just as we want to be able to carry in national parks due to the unknown, I would think Mars is considered unknown. A FN PS90 would work.
 
A FN PS90 would work.
Click to expand...
How do you know it would work?

It wouldn't work in many places on the earth.

And if life on Mars is "unknown", that means we don't know what it might take to shoot & kill it.

You might only pizz'm off!

rc
 
One thing, though ... You wouldn't need to worry about windage! :D

Woody

Damn, you'd think that Spell-Check on a gun forum would know what "windage" is!

I added it in.
 
^ actually there are wind storms +100mph. thats part of the reason the rovers have lived so long: the wind blows the sand & dust off of the solar panels allowing the batteries to keep charged. nasa originally figured a 3 month life based on part due to the accumulation of dust on the solar panels choking the batteries.
 
Soviet Cosmonauts carried pistols. It was a point of discussion during Apollo/Soyuz. They weren't for shooting little green men, they were for survival if they crashed on Earth far from rescue.
 
There is, at least as far as I've learned, wind on Mars. But with an average atmospheric pressure of .13 psi ( less than 1% of ours), that just lets you know how extreme the temperature swings are.
 
It won't matter. If Robert Heinlein taught me anything, its that the Martian Old Ones can simply will you out of existence with a thought. Grok what I'm saying?
 
I'm not sure if the shuttle has a survival gun somewhere in case they come down miles form anywhere.
if they go to mars might have an ar7 tucked away for when they get home though a big stick might be more use:uhoh:
 
Sadly, the shuttle has no ejection mechanism or parachute like the capsule series did. If it doesn't land where it's supposed to, it's a probable hull loss, fatal.
 
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