NASA is now engaged in several space flights for the last few years as the space agency, and SpaceX revealed their agreement to fly to the Moon by 2024.

However, the former head of NASA's Mars mission is predicting one thing. Former Mars Program director and SpaceX adviser Scott Hubbard expressed his desire to see a crewed spacecraft land on the Red Planet.

He was not dissatisfied. NASA's statement claimed that the trip to the Moon was positioned as a crucial move toward a future Mars mission.

"It's something I hoped I would see," Hubbard, who is also a SpaceX advisor, said. "So that it's clear ... that they're keeping their eye on the Mars goal and working toward it in this interim fashion," he told Business Insider in a phone interview.

The announcement about the moon project came amid a flurry of stories about NASA's Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars earlier this year.

The first powered operated flight on another planet was accomplished by NASA's Ingenuity helicopter on Monday. For the first time, the rover converted carbon dioxide into oxygen. Both activities were seen as minor moves toward a crewed mission to Mars.

Elon Musk Wants To Bring People To Mars Via SpaceX

Elon Musk, the SpaceX CEO, has repeatedly said that he wants to get people to Mars as quickly as possible. Last year, he predicted that 1 million people would live on Mars by 2050.

He said earlier this year that he was sure the first crewed mission would take place in 2026, although some analysts were skeptical. Musk said the first trip could happen in "a few years" at a press conference on Friday.

In space travel, moving rapidly carries significant risk. Musk appeared to understand this when he said this week at another function that "a lot of people will actually die" when crews travel to Mars. He added that this would be equivalent to the previous risk associated with discovery.

ALSO READ: Elon Musk Confirms Sticking to the Launch Date of the First Starships to Mars for the Future Mars City Spacex Is Building  


Is NASA Taking Small Measures?

According to Hubbard, NASA is taking small measures. First and foremost, the organization will learn to survive and work on the Moon. Establishing a permanent base on the Moon would be a learning opportunity that will help crews as they arrive on Mars.

The journey to the Moon takes only three days, but the journey to Mars takes about seven months. Hubbard expressed enthusiasm for Mars and expressed a need for astronauts to return to Earth.

Hubbard added there'd been talk about one-way trips, too.

How NASA and SpaceX Will Get People From Earth to Mars and Safely Back Again?

Mars is still a long way off for mankind.

NASA and SpaceX collaborate on missions to the ISS, with different concepts about how a crewed Mars mission will work, according to SciTechDaily.

Size Matters

The greatest obstacle (or limitation) is the mass of the payload for spacecraft, humans, supplies, and more.

The payload is just a small fraction of the total mass of the rocket.

For example, the Saturn V rocket that launched Apollo 11 weighed 3,000 tonnes.

But it could only launch only 140 tonnes to low Earth orbit and less than 2% of its original mass to the Moon.

Mass and size reduce the dimensions and limits of a Mars spacecraft. Any maneuver requires jet fuel, and this needs to be loaded into the spacecraft.

Engineers will refuel their crewed spacecraft in orbit with a special tanker. That dramatically increases the amount of fuel that can be lofted into space.

Time Matters

Time complicates the issue.

Planets that don't assign crews to the Sun's far outer planets usually use mass-assisted slingshots to obtain enough energy to hit their target.

This minimizes fuel consumption but needs years to get to the destination. people will never desire to do

They believe that a spacecraft could hit Mars in half the time, but that would need twice as much fuel.

Landing Matters

Bringing a craft down from 10,000 feet matters!

Suppose our spaceship and astronauts reach Mars; the hard part is over.

Earth interaction slows a satellite down. Keeps the craft on the ground (provided it can survive the related heating).

The atmosphere is just 100 times thinner on Mars. It indicates that we'll need more runway assistance to do so.

Other missions use thrusters, such as NASA's Mars Pathfinder. Hence, these spacecrafts need more fuel.

Life On Mars

There are no other parallels between Earth and Mars.

Since the thin atmosphere on Mars retains heat well, there are significant day-to-night temperature differences on Mars.

However, the absolute zero point of Mars is -140 ℉, so this seems pretty comfortable to me. It is about 48 F at the South Pole in the winter.

Therefore, we must be extremely careful when creating a home on Mars and when it is dark.

Returning to Earth

Bringing them back on Earth is the most difficult of all.

Apollo 11 had just left the Kármán's orbit when it entered the Earth's atmosphere at 40,000m/s.

Spacecraft returning from Mars has re-entry velocities between 47,000 km/h and 54,000 km/h based on the orbit used.

They will slow down to 28km/h in Earth orbit before entering the atmosphere, but they need more fuel to do so.

Anything will be decelerated if they drop in the barrel. Make sure we don't have G-forces and don't scorch the astronauts.

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