For today's post, I have been considering those that have entered the mining profession. They risk their lives to work deep under the surface of the Earth and collect the metals and minerals we take for granted on a daily basis. Silver, copper, and even salt all must be extracted from the dirt by people that spend long stretches of time away from the light of the sun.
In recent years, many people have discussed a secondary source for many of these minerals. It would still require the risks and skill of miners. However, reaching this source comes with a new set of challenges. After all, it takes more than a pick and shovel to mine an asteroid.
The locator beacon was transmitting its signal loud and clear. The survey crew had marked a very promising rock. Their preliminary scans and tests seemed to indicate the presence of iron and copper ores along with some other trace minerals. As the only miner close enough to reach it without exhausting too much fuel, Jackson would be the one luck enough to make a claim on the asteroid. If he survived the excursion, this haul would make him a very tidy profit. There might even be enough funds left over to upgrade some of the systems in his craft. A larger cargo pod would mean larger future hauls for even more profit. That would have to wait until Jackson had a chance to see exactly how much he could extract from this rock.
The beacon was about 5 degrees to his left and about 20 degrees under his feet. A couple of short bursts from his maneuvering thrusters would place the beacon directly in front of him. A brief burn of his main engine would start narrowing the 50 kilometer distance. He could close the gap more quickly with a longer burn of his engine, but that would cost more fuel now and again when it came time to slow down and approach the asteroid itself. Besides, the longer travel time would give Jackson more time to power up and run diagnostics on his mining equipment and space suit.
Some time later, Jackson is standing on a large barren rock. The ticking of his landing thrusters as they cool unheard behind him. His helmet keeping him alive and and blocking out any slight sounds that might make their way through the emptiness around him and the asteroid. The only things Jackson could sense were the sounds of his suit's air recycler and the pressure of the suit itself on his body. The lamps on his helmet don't brighten the omnipresent darkness much more than a few feet in front of him.
Jackson sticks the probe in his left hand deep into the powdery soil clinging to the surface of the asteroid. He extracts the probe and places the sample in its tip into the machine he had been dragging behind him for testing. As he waits for the results, he is momentarily envious of the tales of his great-grandfather and grandfather and their years mining. It was said they could both swing a pick into the ground and pull it out. They would then lick the dirt that stuck to the tip. They each had the legendary ability to taste whether or not the ground had enough profitable ores to stake a claim. Jackson had been tempted more than once with the urge to test his own sense of taste and its affinity for minerals. It was the need to maintain a seal on his helmet that kept him from doing so.
Jackson had traveled about half the distance between his landing spot and the survey team's beacon. He had collected enough samples to know the powdery "soil" had enough trace minerals to make it worth collecting. It would require deeper probes into the harder core material of the asteroid to determine how much profit, if any, there would actually be.
If it were possible right now, would you want to be a part of a team surveying asteroids for possible minerals? Or would you prefer the solitary existence of a miner itself? While mining asteroids is still firmly planted in science fiction, much of the technology to do it does exist today.
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