I've got a strong feeling it won't be in my lifetime.

Probably not in the distant future. I would say fifty years.

That's what i think. I'll be an old man by then.

I think it's mostly a matter of funding. If enough money was put into it by governments, I don't think the technology part would be too hard to manage.

We just need to wait until it becomes a good thing to do politically. Either that or wait for the private industry to take over. Whichever comes first.

I think it will happen within a few decades.

in 70 years lol

Well I would say since we did so many "succesfull apollo missions" then why not sooner. We have way better technology now and if you look at what they supposadly did back in the 60's with apollo, I would say we have a better chance of making a succesfull mission to mars today than when we went to the moon. So I say mabee 10 to 20 years hopefully. I bet we will have to wait and see how the next moon landing goes first......

We didn't "supposedly" do it in the 1960s. We actually did do it.


However, social emphases and a progressively inept congressional body have, until recently, prohibited further manned space exploration efforts in the United States. Thanks to President Bush, we now have a mandate to return to exploration, and are in the process of developing the spacecraft and systems necessary to return us to the Moon, and to develop systems which will lead to the exploration of Mars by men in the future.

It will likely be anothter 13 to 15 years before we return to the lunar surface with the Constellation program. After that, perhaps a couple decades before we make it to the surface of Mars. There is a massive amount of work to be done before such a mission can be attempted. Were probably talking 2040 or so before a Manned Mars exploration takes place.

Yeah depending on circumstances, probably 40-60 years.

I agree with what everybody else is saying. A few decades before we get a manned mission to mars. I think it'll be a good thing for us to go there. But however I doubt we'll land anywhere of any real interest. Like the Sydonya Plane where the face on mars and the Pyramids are. No we'll probably land near a crater of something and examine that stuff.

Rethought it probably not for 50 years

Pilot....


All of Mars is of interest. Anywhere on its surface will be fine for Man's first visit, and wherever that it, it'll be of extreme interest.


p.s., there is no "face" on Mars.

Or pyramids for that matter.

That's pretty much what I was going to say. How can anywhere on another planet not be interesting? How can a small planet with a 15 mile high volcano which posses a valley system that would stretch from the east coast to the west coast of the United States and where it can snow carbon dioxide at the poles not be interesting?



Nor pyramids nor indeed a place called Sydonya (close but no cigar, it's Cydonia). There is enough discussion on these objects in the Extraterrestrial Life & The UFO Phenomenon forum, and detailed discussion here would be taking the subject of topic. Suffice to say that there is absolutely no scientific evidence to support artificial structures on Mars and plenty to support these interesting features being natural.

As to the question asked, when we set foot on Mars is really dependent on two things; budget and political will. As political will is responsible for the budget available I suppose it could be argued that it is the only thing holding us back.

Much of the technology required already exists. A manned spacecraft to Mars will be a large vehicle (some believe as big as the ISS). We have the ability to build such a vehicle now. With the new Ares V launch vehicle which will be built for the return to the moon it will be even easier to construct large spacecraft in earth orbit.

There is more research needed in protecting astronauts from exposure to radiation in deep space, which due to the length of the mission (several months each way) will be a much MUCH bigger threat than it ever was with Apollo. In particular the threat from solar storms and Coronal Mass Ejections will need to be addressed. Due to the short period that Apollo spent outside the Van Allen belts the chances of a mission being hit by such an event was low. For a Mars mission it is almost a certainty. Without protection such an event could incapacitate or kill a crew.

We also have no experience of long term survival on another world. A mission to Mars will have almost certainly involve a stay on the surface of weeks or months. NASA's planned Moon base will provide such experience.

We also have experience of long term exposure to zero G (some of the Soviet Cosmonauts spent periods of greater than a year in orbit). What we have no knowledge of is experience with reduced G. This is something else that the moon base will teach us.

So really what is holding us back is experience not knowledge. Once that is gained we will be ready to go if the budget is available. That budget depends on the governments of the space-faring nations.

I am slightly more optimistic than some. I think, if the will to do it is there, we could see the first human boot prints on Mars within 20-25 years.

Lol, i think we have already set foot on Mars. there just keeping it confidential from us.

Different subject-Has Mars got Air inside its atmosphere?

"Air", which is what we call our atmosphere, is made up of different gases (nitrogen (78%), oxygen (21%), Carbon dioxide, argon, and other gasses (1%)).

The atmosphere of Mars is composed of about 95% carbon dioxide, about 2.5-3.0% nitrogen, maybe 1% argon, and a wee bit of oxygen.


Components of Earth's atmosphere, or air, make up the Mars atmosphere as well. But "air", per-se (the exact mixture of gasses we have) is not to be found on Mars.

Even if it was "air" covering Mars, it's only about .007 Atmospheres of pressure, which isn't anywhere close to something which could sustain human life, or liquid water (Mars' atmosphere is about as thin as ours is at 90,000-95,000 feet, which means it's deadly, whatever it's made of!).

Yep, that's about it in a nutshell.
If it were me going, I'd land...a n y w h e r e, and I should shudder to think I'd find it uninteresting.

I don't recall, 38 years ago, thinking the Sea of Tranquility was uninteresting...in the least!




Agreed. I think the general NASA estimate of 2040-ish gives them some lee-way. I personally expect it sooner...so long as the will remains...

Boy its been a long time since we went to the moon..... Wonder why they need to "devolpe the spacecraft and systems necessary" if we pulled off 12 successfull missions 40 years ago? Things that make you go hmmmmmmm.

Well, Enigma...it's a good question, but...


It's a long story, which involves short-sighted leadership, the tendency of the American public to swiftly become jaded as pertains to the extraordinary, and national priorites, as well as a particular President's desire to have his own space legacy (Nixon, and the Shuttle, which didn't exactly pan out for him). In other words, we quit exploring the Moon, and scrapped all of the spacecraft we built for the effort. And it's been that way for over 30 years.


We have new technologies, and a new mission profile to execute. This involves voluminous studies on aspects we didn't need to study for the Apollo program, and of course new spacecraft to execute this new and much more involved profile...spacecraft which will be based on Apollo designs, but which will incorporate new technologies that have been developed since that time, with an eye toward longer stays on the surface, and long-term studies to base our Mars manned mission upon...which Apollo was not designed to do.

We know how to get there, since we've done it already, but simply re-building Apollo wouldn't allow us to execute the new mission profile (that would be like re-fabricating a Model T Ford to drive across country, when we have the ability to build highly more sophisticated cars that can exeucte the mission much more rapidly and efficiently).

I suppose the bottom line is that we need to develop the spacecraft and systems necessary because we aren't doing the same thing we did on Apollo...we're doing alot more, and we need alot more to allow that to happen.

M~