The company Space Exploration Technologies Corporation (SpaceX) has a new milestone to set, which involves having one of their capsules successfully landing on Mars by 2018. SpaceX took to Twitter on April 27 their goal in the next couple of years. But they are not the only one with the same goal since NASA also posted their plans of having U.S. astronauts land on the Red Planet soon.
The New York Times reported that the company owned by Elon Musk is aiming to set a new record involving their Dragon capsule landing on Mars in May 2018. The rocket company has been successful in having one of their spacecraft landing on earth in December 2015 and this time, their goal is massive enough to take over lands in the outer space.
A photo posted by SpaceX (@spacex) on Apr 27, 2016 at 11:49am PDT
On the other hand, NPR said that NASA has the same goal of sending astronauts and rockets in space only around 2030. The Deputy Administrator of NASA, Dava Newman said that they are closer to sending U.S. astronauts to the Red Planet "than anyone, anywhere, at any time has ever been."
The two giant companies for space travel were also reported to merge their ideas to make their same goal of sending astronauts on space soon. SpaceX's Dragon 2 capsule is supposed to bring humans to Mars, but upon tests and further observations, critics are saying it might not be possible. The size of the Dragon might not be fit for humans to survive its travel all the way from earth to the moon.
But despite that comment, Elon Musk said that their Dragon 2 is capable of sending humans "anywhere in the solar system." As for SpaceX and NASA's collaboration, a representative of the former said that the latter is bound to give them technical assistance.
Do you think it is going to be a successful collaboration? Or would SpaceX land on Mars with their Dragon ahead of NASA's goal? Tell us what you think using the comments section below.
