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We haven't put GPS satellites around Mars quite yet. I'm guessing that won't happen until it gets terraformed.


On the other hand if we are coming in from space in the first place, it might not be too terribly hard to drop a few satellites off on your way down?


Further if you're not looking for realtime direction finding and you're willing to wait a few minutes for a fix, you can get away with far fewer satellites.

Putting 6 small satellites in orbit and getting position fixes every hour would still be way better than nothing.


How would the satellites themselves maintain their proper positions relative to Mars, without ground stations to orient against?


We already stipulated that we're landing something on the surface. That could include a stationary transmitter, which satellites could use to periodically update their location and velocity.


Yeah, agreed, my comment was meant to politely point out the necessity to the people thinking we could get away with "dropping a few satellites" ;)


All of these things can be done remotely without any wetware on Mars.


"How?"


Like we do everything on and around Mars now.



I think terraformed is long after we'd want GPS. Once we have any sort of Martian colony (which is usually a prerequisite for terraforming, not the other way around) and the ability to build rockets and fuel from Martian resources, it should be straightforward for Martians to set up a GPS network of their own (easier than Earth, probably, due to the lower gravity and thinner atmosphere).


It could be set up years ahead of any significant ground presence, at a fairly small cost.


Existing GPS satellites orient themselves by ground stations, so we'd need at least some ground presence. Said presence doesn't have to be manned, though.


Or they could orient by celestial navigation. Or have their position measured remotely and updated from Earth.


That being said, how many satellites are orbiting Mars right now that could be used to help determine position?



Looks like 5 of those are active rather than proposed.




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