Irish scientist dropped from Mars One mission

The Irish scientist shortlisted for the Mars One mission which plans to have humans living on the red planet within 10 years will no longer be considered for the crew on the €5 billion project.

Planet Mars Image by Paul T. / CC BY 2.0

A specialist working on the Mars One Mission, Dr Norbert Kraft, told RTE radio in Ireland today that Dr Joseph Roche, an Assistant Professor at Trinity College Dublin, had broken confidentiality by expressing publicly his serious doubts about the project and would be dropped from the 100 candidates still in the running to make the journey.

The Irish scientists said yesterday he had concerns over the selection process and also was baffled by the organisers “reluctance to embrace the scientific community.”

Dr Kraft, in disclosing that Dr Roche would no longer be left on the shortlist, said it was vital to have trust in these situations and this had now been broken. “We rely on teamwork,” he said, adding that because the trust was gone, the Irishman would not be considered further.

Various numbers from 3000 to 200,000 people are said to have applied to take part in the privately funded one-way mission that aims to create a permanent human settlement on the red planet.

The vision is to have four-man crews departing every two years once the project gets up and running within a decade.

The mission is being supported by Dutch entrepreneur Bas Lansdorp, but will be financed through the creation of a reality TV show around the project as well as private crowd-funding.