In 1969 people were celebrating the first manned mission to the moon. People were in awe of their own ability. So when Mariner 6 and 7 went to mars nobody really cared because they were so caught up about the lunar missions. Mariner 6 and 7 were two flybys of Mars. Their main job was to measure the ionosphere (the shell of charged particles high in the atmosphere) of Mars. They found that Mars' atmosphere was mainly Carbon Dioxide. NASA then sent two Viking landers in 1976. The Viking landers confirmed that the atmosphere of Mars was mainly Carbon Dioxide. Nobody realized though that tons of rocket fuel could be synthesized out of Mars' air. Then in the 1980's Martian meteorites showed that the planet's soil contained a material that could be easily made into a building substance. For the past 15 years space scientists and engineers have wor

There are many ideas to get man on to Mars. Hopefully they will begin to send manned missions to Mars soon. It will be hard but I think if countries join forces in this common goal humans could conquer Mars. I hope that they begin colonizing Mars in my lifetime because I would like to live on a different planet.

After George Bush called for a manned mission to Mars, NASA saw how much money it would take and how long. They said it would cost about 400 billion dollars and 30 years. That's a lot of money and time to get a few astronauts there and plant a flag. A Man, Mr. Zubrin, thought that it would cost a lot less. NASA's idea was to first build a multi-billion dollar space station orbiting earth. Then they would begin assembly of the spacecraft on the space station. This is because the spacecraft would have to be huge in order to have enough fuel to go to Mars and back. But Zubrin's idea was to have enough fuel to get to Mars. Then use hydrogen brought from earth and the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to make liquid oxygen and methane to use for rocket fuel. NASA said it would cost 55 billion dollars to do it that way, but Zubrin says it would cost 5 billion if done by companies and not the government. (Sky and Telescope)

Another plan for getting humans onto Mars is called

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Approximate Word count = 866
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)