Why the return trip seems shorter.
[Update a few minutes later]
Speaking of deep-space missions (not that it’s likely to ever fly any, or fly at all), Chris Bergin has a pretty extensive write-up on the Senate Launch System.
4 thoughts on “I Wonder If This Will Apply To Deep Space Missions?”
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When I was a kid I not only found that the return trip went faster, I also found that subsequent outbound trips to a place I’d been before went faster than the first trip.
Still do.
It’s difference of focusing on an unknown vs. a known.
Horses focus on oats.
I think when you leave on a trip that is going to be a round trip you see the trip in it’s total time when you leave. Going to the moon and back is going to be an 7-8 day trip. So it takes long to get there because you see it as it’s total time. When you return, most of the total trip time is already over and that return time represents only a small portion of the total trip time. So that return home seems to go faster because most of the total trip time is already burned up.
I had to make a couple long (~1300 mile each way) road trips this year. On the trips out, I was rested when I left but I knew that every mile out meant driving that same mile going home. The trip home seemed a little faster but I was more tired at the beginning.
On a trip to Mars, the crew will not only have a long, long voyage ahead of them but the constant strain of danger. They’ll have the most dangerous parts like landing on Mars, operating in a hostile environment for extended periods, and launching for the return trip. Once they’ve left Mar’s orbit for the trip home, most of the really dangerous parts are behind them.