What did the 1987 Mars surface plan actually specify?
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) developed its Mars mission study for NASA’s Office of Exploration from January to November 1987. Its proposed piloted missions would take about one year round trip, spend 30 to 45 days near Mars, and include 10-to-20-day surface excursions to investigate potential future outpost sites and build interplanetary flight experience[1].
That is the extent of the surface-exploration detail given here: the account does not specify traverse routes or surface vehicles for the 1987 study. Pressurized-rover exploration and deploying an inflatable greenhouse appear instead in a 1997 surface-mission workshop discussing a different, 500-to-600-day Mars stay[2]. These were planning proposals, not descriptions of human Mars missions that had flown[3].
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