Nitpick "The Martian"

[Rune]

Only all his friends are dead, ruining the happy ending, Hermes is empty, which means no Rich Purnell manoeuvre, and no qualified pilot on hand to remotely launch the MAV. Food now isn't so much of a problem, because Watney has a ready supply of meat. Each of his friends can feed him for about about 6 weeks to a month, more if he rations himself, so with five of them, he can probably buy an entire year, during which he grows and stockpiles potatoes, and creates a much bigger window for an unrushed resupply probe to reach him.

It turns the whole thing into a very different story.

Yeah, that would be a very different book. Probably much more realistic, but a whole other genre and without the media impact of this one. But let's put on my storyteller hat and try to fix this story since someone asked...

Watney has to be alone (dubious in a nominal situation), and the rest of the crew has to be forced to GTFO without waiting for him. That is kind of the premise. They don't necessarily have to think him dead to leave him, it would add more drama even a conversation where he says goodbye. While I'm rewriting some else's book (bad manners, I know), I can actually add some death to the story, but a light one, by invoking a fallen comrade in the first five minutes, neatly sidestepping the issue of why the hell he wasn't with any other astronaut at any given time on the surface (in no universe would the EVA rules allow for that). Say he was on a rover trip, an extended one. Couple of days out, in a rover that can actually charge itself already or runs on beefier fuel cells. Makes more credible the later adaptation. Now here is my quicker: meteor strike as thereason to leave. Astronomical odd to the rescue! the right rock at the right distance could topple a rover far away, and damage the landing gear on a MAV without completely tipping it over. With a tilting MAV on damaged gear, no comms with the rover thet was closer to the meteor blast, and convenient telemetry of the death of one of the passengers, they have no chance but to evacuate just like in the book. In the meantime, Watney has been flung outside the rover, saving himself from breaking his faceplate like his unfortunate teammate, but is unconscious a couple days hike from the Hab, and without long-range comms not being jacked to the MAV.

Any other good explosion could do if you change the scenario a bit and damage the suit radio telemetry like Weir did, actually. Say the ISRU equipment is duplicated, some distance away because, for example, landing ellipses or safety regulations, where they can't make out details, and a storm is blowing further obscuring visibility. While Watney and his unfortunate friend go to check out some faulty readings, the backup fuel supply blows due to a short (the reason it's some distance away, could be), and a very improbably aimed piece damages the MAV just enough so that is springs a slow leak when they pressurize the tanks on the remote checkups that follow the incident. It can limp to orbit, but the fuel/helium/nitrogen/life support situation is getting worse, and they have to call an immediate abort. The ISRU facility is on fire and some equipment could have secondary explosions, or the second refinery blow itself in sympathy, so it's not like it's safe to hang a bit and retrieve the corpses. Again, handy telemetry of two dead astronauts makes the decision easier, but this time you don't get the possibility of Watney saying goodbye.

As to the dead guy next to him and cannibalism, well, he is only one so he doesn't really change the equations that much, and Watney would leave him for last out of respect, so he may not need him at all in the end. Or you could bend any known safety regulation and have him EVAing alone, or his crewmate made a big blooper and think him actually dead after losing track of him in the explosion. Maybe he got a rebar in him after all, now that there is a source of actual power to make spectacular things happen.

Rune. There, two scenarios. Now you guys pick the holes on each.

[Bill Phil]

And you have any idea just how badly NASA would have to drop the ball for that to happen again?

The only way that would happen is if a craft as poorly designed as the apollo spacecraft was used.

I know exactly how bad they would have to drop the ball for that to happen. They would have to literally drop the ball. The ball that is the oxygen tank. That was dropped.

It wasn't the design at all. It was a problem with the tank on that spacecraft. Which was dropped and thus damaged. That specific tank was also supposed to be Apollo 10's oxygen tank. Which would have been worse, since it would have been two accidents before landing.

Edited July 6, 2015 by Bill Phil