NASA released tentative outlines for a manned Mars mission to take place within the next "few decades."
A skeleton crew on a 30-month round-trip mission would leave in a nearly 500 ton spacecraft for the Red Planet. The ship would be built in low-Earth orbit using Ares V, heavy-lift, launch rockets.
To leave in February 2031, the estimated cost would be $20-450 billion. That's... a very broad estimation, I'll say.
The astronauts would have means of growing their own fruits and vegetables, and would use nuclear energy to power their habitat. Air and water would be recycled by "closed-loop" life support systems. Their re-supply and operation-aborting options would be very limited, so they would have to be good mechanics -- possibly to the extent that they would know how to manufacture their own parts.
The moon may be used to test some of these radical ideas.
A skeleton crew on a 30-month round-trip mission would leave in a nearly 500 ton spacecraft for the Red Planet. The ship would be built in low-Earth orbit using Ares V, heavy-lift, launch rockets.
To leave in February 2031, the estimated cost would be $20-450 billion. That's... a very broad estimation, I'll say.
The astronauts would have means of growing their own fruits and vegetables, and would use nuclear energy to power their habitat. Air and water would be recycled by "closed-loop" life support systems. Their re-supply and operation-aborting options would be very limited, so they would have to be good mechanics -- possibly to the extent that they would know how to manufacture their own parts.
The moon may be used to test some of these radical ideas.
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