I haven't heard anything about it for years. Then again I don't really look for it, but I'm curious. How far have we come along? Have we made any significant progress? Is there a chance a human could land on it within 20 years?

Enlighten me.

NASA said a man will be on Mars by 2050, and they are sending some other stuff I can't remember.

Damn .. I'll be old as hell by then .. I thought we would get there sooner than that

There's a project slated to reach completion (at the very least in funding, and assuming engineering and testuing will take place at the same time) between 2018 and 2025. It's a manned misison thats going to bring a group of astronauts to mars for 500 days. I'm not sure if they're going to land, but I think that would be the idea; otherwise, the mission would be ludicrous imo, since research can be done by robots (it's been done on Mars before). The trip there could last anywhere from about 5 months to several months longer, and conditions on Mars range from extreme heat to extreme cold, and there's no way an astronaut would survive without internal ventilation. Two majors concerns exist: cosmic radiation and funding. Cosmic radiation effects DNA of astronauts, and a round trip of 2-3 years in duration would play havoc on the astronauts' DNA, thereby increasing their risks of developing cancer, among other things. They would also lose bone mass. So until scientists can raise funds and fix those rather hefty issues, I don't know if a trip like that would happen. I'm related (through marriage) to someone involve in the euro space agency, and I'm told they're currently way ahead of the US on a lot of things, so it's possible that a joint mission would be undertaken. But that's several years down the road in terms of success.

This guy is the dude I mentioned: http://www.sla.maschinenbau.tu-darmstadt.de/tropea/tropea.htm

This post was edited by RewtheBrave on Dec 12 2008 08:29pm

Thats pretty interesting. Really, as long as I saw it within the next 20 years I wouldn't be disapointed. The concept alone of being on an entirely different planet is mind-blowing. I've always had a strong interest in astronomy, I wish looking back (junior year in college) I had incorporated that into my major in one way or another. But I'm sure the job oppurtunities are slim to none and have a pre-selected list of potential job candidates.

It exploded.

The face is yawning.



Seriously if we invested as much into space as we do into blowing up poor muslim children and raping women around the planet, we would have colonies there already.

watch national geographic

Exploded from what I hear

Edit:

...that's weird. Didn't see that before I posted. So, I change mine to...

Start coming closer to earth at a rapid pace from what I hear

This post was edited by bob08 on Jan 13 2009 01:39pm

this