Many flightplans have been suggested for Martian expeditions which involve 
dumping rockets into the Martian atmosphere or casting them off into 
interplanetery space for the fairly flimsy reason of there not being 
enough delta-v or aerobraking shield to safely keep them attached.

Since it is frequently the case that the main ship must enter a fairly 
close orbit around Mars, this argument is not necessarily as clean cut as 
it may at first appear.  Any such flightplan should consider if it might 
be possible (and usefull) to aerobrake the empty rocketblock (seperatly 
from the crewed ship, of course) into the highest Martian orbit which is 
remotly stable, trusting to its mass to survive.  With a bit of luck 
(and a few gallons of monoprop), the dud rocket might be coaxed down into 
a usefull orbit over the course of several months.  Even if the main tanks 
are punctured by this mistreatment, they might still provide metallic 
feedstock or be cut open and polished, for use as a solar furnace.  Who 
cares if this occurs three months after the landing?  Mass is mass.

The same principal can probably be applied to other situations, but it's 
almost midnight and I need to get up tomorrow morning, so it is left as an 
excercise to the reader.  Having someone cunning to handle such 
opertunistic recycling on these flights would be a boon.  In fact, in 
larger crews, it might be an idea to appoint someone exclusivly to handle 
wringing more use out of every last scrap of mass.


  - Alistair McLaren, Oct 2003