James Mangan
Team Member

n September 21, the United States

made a great achievement. Late that
Sunday evening, spacecraft Maven achieved
an orbit around Mars. The purpose of this
spacecraft is to examine the atmosphere of
the red planet. Maven will now spend the
next year (that’s in earth time) determining
whether Mars may have at one point had
an atmosphere capable of sustaining water.
Two days later, another incident occurred
that is almost equally worthy of praise. On
September 23, India’s Mars Orbiter Mission
(MOM) also achieved an orbit around one of
our closest planetary neighbour.

Both spacecrafts are designed to perform
similar experiments in Mars’ upper
atmosphere, but Maven is much better suited
for the task. Why is India celebrating what
appears to be a redundant mission, especially
since Maven is able to outperform MOM?
India’s justification is that this mission is
their first mission to Mars’ orbit. The fact
that something not much larger than a

vehicle found on the roads of Prince George
was able to travel 771 million kilometers to
find itself in a stable orbit around another
planet, and that this feat represents the
national will of India, was enough of a
reason to engage in the $75 million project.

Nationalism has historically been the prime
motivator for nations to engage in Space
Exploration. Beginning in the late 1950s, the
United States and Soviet Union were racing
to break Earth’s gravitational pull in order to
prove their superiority over one another. On
April 12, 1961, Yuri Gagarin, a soviet pilot in
training, became the first man in space. By
the end of the day, the young Cosmonaut’s
108 minute voyage had seemingly proven
the Soviet Union’s scientific superiority not
just to the world, but to its own people.

As aresult, space exploration became a
pivotal role in the Russian identity, so much
so that Soviet officials refused to listen to
Gagarin in 1967 when he claimed that the
Soviet-made Soyuz 1 spacecraft, scheduled

to launch on the 50th anniversary of the
Russian Revolution, would not work. The
Soviet Union, dedicated to the idea of proving

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National pride and
the final frontier

its natural superiority to its citizens, were
not interested in such trivial nonsense

such as the safety and wellbeing of their
cosmonauts. On April 23, 1967, Soyuz 1 pilot
and personal friend of Gagarin, Vladimir
Komaroy, was killed when his parachute
failed to deploy upon his re-entry. Although
not the first man to die for the sake of
nationalism, Komarov was the first man

to die as a result of space exploration.

Unlike in the former Soviet Union,

safety standards for astronauts today are
paramount. Therefore, tragedies such

as Space Shuttle Challenger’s disaster

of 1983 and Space Shuttle Columbia’s
disintegration upon re-entry in 2003 are all
events of national mourning. Despite the
horrific memories of these accident, space
exploration is still encouraged and supported
by the people of every space-faring nation.
Even in the face of danger, nations demand
investment in scientific exploration.

Canada is not immune to the allure of
nationalism regarding space exploration.
The development and implementation of
the Canadarm aboard the International

Space Station (ISS) was a proud heritage
moment. Chris Hadfield, the first Canadian
to act as commander aboard the ISS,

made global headlines through his use

of social media to engage us earthlings

in the daily lives of astronauts. This not
only cemented Col. Hadfield as a Canadian
hero, but also excited Canadians with the
prospect of space exploration, as well

as Canada’s role in scientific inquiry.

Space exploration and national pride
have been intertwined since the very first
space programs began firing rockets into
the sky. Even today in the United States,
where NASA lost a majority of its funding
as a result of the 2009 recession, Americans
celebrate as private enterprise act as
representatives of their nation out in the
final frontier. The sense of nationalism
that emerges as a by-product of scientific
inquiry is not only beneficial for national
morale, but also for scientific progress.

As aresult, when we watch India launch a
satellite into Mars’ orbit for the first time,
we celebrate right along with them.