NZ driller eyes life on Mars

By SIMON COLLINS science reporter

A small New Zealand drilling company is helping America's space agency to design a robot to look for signs of life on Mars.

The National Aeronautic and Space Administration (Nasa) sent officials to the Canadian Arctic last month to watch Porirua company Webster Drilling and Exploration drill through permafrost.

Webster geologist Jeff Ashby said the company's specialist technology, originally developed with Victoria University for New Zealand scientific projects in Antarctica, could be just what Nasa needs to drill on the frozen surface of Mars.

The company and university are also about to start a $3.3 million project to put together a drilling rig for the five-nation Andrill consortium, to drill under Antarctica to plot changes in the world's climate over the past 40 million years.

"We are nothing special," Dr Ashby said modestly. "We are just a small drilling company with specialist expertise in certain areas."

The company has developed a method of drilling that uses compressed air instead of water to pump material up to the surface, so that it can avoid contaminating the pristine Antarctic environment.

"We are probably one of the few companies that, when we go to Antarctica, has to take refrigeration units with us because when we are drilling in compressed air you have to cool the air down after it has been compressed," Dr Ashby said.

"We certainly can assist Nasa in some of the basic drilling techniques that are required for permafrost. Now it's a case of trying to roboticise the mind of the drillers."

Two Nasa missions and a European spacecraft will land on Mars in January, taking advantage of the planet and Earth being their closest in 60,000 years.

Scientists believe that microscopic life-forms may exist inside rocks and ice on Mars, as they do in Antarctica.

But it is still expected to take years to develop the technology required to send an unmanned mission to drill under the planet's icy surface.

Alex Pyne, operations manager of Victoria University's Antarctic Centre, said the small rig demonstrated in the Arctic weighed about a tonne, compared with the 100-tonne rig needed for the Andrill project in Antarctica. But Nasa had a weight limit of 40kg.

Dr Ashby believes the equipment can be adapted.

"We are one of those people who will never say it's impossible.

"There could be a timing factor. If they want to scale this down to the size they want, perhaps this thing will have to sit there for a period of months or even years, rather than days, to get the data."

Nasa was now thinking about how it could apply Webster's techniques.

"I think we will enter into some productive work for them. How far it goes is a little bit unclear."

The company, founded by managing director Bain Webster in 1983, has a core staff of 20 and brings in extras for contract work.

It is exploring for oil in Iran and is about to start drilling holes for border pillars between Ethiopia and Eritrea.

Dr Ashby said it all started with drilling for oil in Taranaki.

"At the moment we are entering into some very large-scale contracts and we don't want to grab too much limelight.

"But we recognise that at some stage we are going to have to open up. We know we are a bit different."