Filed under
human-spaceflight
7 milestones, in chronological order.
- Written 1949, published 1952Canals and Dreamers
Von Braun costs out a Mars expedition
Ten ships, seventy crew, and 950 launches to assemble the fleet in Earth orbit: the first Mars expedition worked out in real numbers, and never flown.
- 7 March 1970First Contact
Nixon says no to Mars
Von Braun had twelve astronauts leaving Earth orbit on 12 November 1981 aboard two nuclear ships. Seven months later Nixon put Mars behind a rigorous system of national priorities.
- Tested 1969, terminated January 1973First Contact
NERVA runs in Nevada, then the money stops
A nuclear engine ran 28 times at Jackass Flats at twice the exhaust velocity of any chemical stage. The budget office zeroed it, and the programme ended in January 1973.
- 3 June 2010 – 4 November 2011The Rover Decades
Six men spend 520 days sealed in a Moscow mock-up
Mars-500 ran a Mars mission at full length with nobody leaving the building. Four of the six crew came out with a sleep or behavioural disorder.
- 31 May – 9 December 2013Follow the Water
Curiosity measures the radiation dose of a Mars trip
The rover's dosimeter logged 1.8 millisieverts a day in transit and 0.67 on the floor of Gale Crater — a round trip comes to roughly one sievert, two thirds past NASA's career ceiling.
- 20 April 2021 – 7 August 2023The Present Push
MOXIE makes oxygen out of Martian air
Perseverance carried a toaster-sized box that heated Martian carbon dioxide to 800°C and made 5.4 grams of oxygen — the first time a spacecraft manufactured a consumable on another planet.
- 2023 – 2026The Present Push
Thirteen Starship flights, and Mars slips to 2028
SpaceX has flown Starship thirteen times since April 2023. None has reached orbit, none has transferred propellant in space, and the 2026 Mars window has been given up.