bill nye
Carol Cao, V
the science guy Bill Nye the Science Guy and a group of seventy other space specialists created a plan for astronauts to land on Mars by 2039. Hosting the Disney/ PBS science show for five years, Nye now states that “we can send humans to Mars without breaking the bank.” Will this plan from our childhood hero finally allow humans to explore the unknown depths of Mars? “Getting humans to Mars is far more complex than getting to Earth’s Moon, but space exploration brings out the best in us. By reaching consensus on the right set of missions, we can send humans to Mars without breaking the bank.” Nye is the CEO of the non-profit organization called The Planetary Society, which established the “Humans Orbiting Mars” workshop from March 31 to April 1 this year. It devised credible strategies to achieve the ultimate goal of building a “long-term, cost constrained, executable program to send humans to Mars.” During the workshop, all of the attendees agreed that an orbit mission around Mars or one of its moons must first happen
before an actual landing. The Planetary Society has determined the cost and probability of having a select group of people orbit around Phobos, one of Mars’ moons: The trip would happen in 2033, lasting for about thirty months. The astronauts would spend eighteen months traveling to and from Phobos, and twelve months orbiting the moon. The organization then predicted a crewed landing on Mars by 2039. When questioned about the future problems with this plan, most crewmembers described them as political, not technical. “I’m not saying the technical challenges aren’t extraordinary and very, very difficult,” Nye said. “And it’s going to take a lot of thoughtful engineers and scientists giving it a lot of thought and science. But the real problem is politics—or the real opportunity is politics.” The fate of this project depends solely on the president’s will to support it. This is not the only mission to Mars. As human technology develops into unthinkable extents, other plans for the red planet are still present. Some of the more popular ones are the Dutch’s one-way trip to Mars and Elon Musk’s Mars flyby schedule that will happen soon. This great effort by Bill Nye the Science Guy, however, might bring back astronauts that have first-handedly experienced and seen the mystery that is Mars.
PLANS FOR MARS
11