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NASA
planning one-way mission to colonise Mars
Thursday, October 21, 2010 10:43:34 PM, IANS
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Indian Mars mission by 2013, says ISRO
Indian Space research Organisation (ISRO) chairman G. Madavan Nair
said on Monday that India would launch a mission to Mars by 2013.
"We have given a call for proposal to different scientific
communities. Depending on the type of experiments
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London:
This NASA mission will boldly go where no man has gone before - to
Mars. But then do forget about coming back to the Earth.
NASA is investigating the possibility of humans colonising other
worlds such as the Red Planet in an ambitious project named the
Hundred Years Starship.
The settlers would be sent supplies from the Earth, but would go
on the understanding that it would be too costly or too
time-consuming for them to make the return trip.
NASA Ames Centre director Pete Worden revealed that the centre has
received one million pounds' funding to start work on the project,
the Daily Mail reported.
The research team has also received an additional 100,000 pounds
from NASA.
"You heard it here," Worden said at 'Long Conversation', an event
in San Francisco in the US. "We also hope to inveigle some
billionaires to form a Hundred Year Starship fund."
Worden said he has discussed the potential price tag for one-way
trips to Mars with Google co-founder Larry Page, telling him that
such a mission could be done for $10 billion.
"His response was, 'Can you get it down to $1 [billion] or
$2billion?' So now we're starting to get a little argument over
the price," Worden said.
The most recent unmanned mission to Mars was Nasa's Phoenix lander,
which was launched in August 2007 and landed on the planet's north
polar cap in May the following year.
Experts said a nuclear-fuelled rocket could shorten the journey to
about four months.
Of all the planets in the solar system, Mars is the most likely to
have substantial quantities of water, making it the best bet for
sustaining life.
Worden claims that humans could be on Mars' moons by 2030.
Mars is half the size of Earth, has two polar ice caps and has
similar seasons to our planet. The Martian day is only 41 minutes
longer than the day on Earth.
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