Why haven't astronauts landed on Mars yet?

Question

I know we have the proper technology whats taking us them long?

You mean to tell me it's not enough money to travel 7 months with food water and fuel?I can do that in my car(i just might to pay ten times for)

Fuel but i can do it.

Answer 1

In 1989, scientists were asked to estimate the price of a manned Mars mission. They had 90 days to do so, and their report was called the 90-day report.
They proposed and enormous spacecraft, that was supposed to be build in orbit, that should send a group of astronauts in orbit around Mars to let them land on Mars, and when they come back into the craft, it brings them back to earth.
This spacecraft was supposed to run on liquid hydrogen ( H2 ) and liquid oxygen ( O2 ). All supplies were supposed to be brought from earth.

Their result: a catastrophic $400 billion.

This was clearly too much for NASA. They abandoned the manned Mars mission, hoping to find a cheaper way to get there

Unfortunately, we probably wont see a manned Mars mission until we see either ion propulsion or anti-matter propulsion engines, or much better cryogenic hibernation technology (All of which may be coming a lot sooner than most people think, Some countries are talking of planning manned Mars missions as soon as 2020)

Answer 2

Well, then....why haven't you landed on Mars?

Since you're already qualified and experienced, why don't you just get the jump on the rest of the world and go there?

Check your wallet. The gas stations are few and far between.

We got robots that can go there and spend lots more time doing experiments and sending back information at less than a tenth the cost.

The proper technology might also include an air regeneration system, don't you think? Well, the one the Rusky's brought to the ISS keeps breaking down, and the US version hasn't been put to the ultimate tests yet. So, if it's no great inconvenience to your antsy bad self, lets let the dang stuff get certified as reliable. Repair parts are hard to come by when you're 50 million or so miles from home.

And, oh yes, the other life-support stuff like enough food and water for a freakin' year and a half round trip. You got that figured out yet? There's a slew of engineers at NASA that would love to hear from you.

It would be nice if you'd read up on the technology before you claim it already exists.

Answer 3

Quite a few reasons listed above. In addition, a six month trip out there means a 6 month trip back. That is over a year in just traveling, not to mention the required time to spend on the other planet. Developing something that can sustain that long of a period in space, sustaining multiple people is right now out of our capability.

In addition we still need to develop the propulsion technology to make it feasible. There isn't that big of a market out there for spaceship rockets other than NASA. Nothing is saying that if we put our mind to it like the Apollo program we couldn't be there in ten years though. It would just take a lot of effort and money. Perhaps the fastest way for America to reach Mars is for China to announce their plans to reach Mars.

Answer 4

It would take several months to get to mars....months to stay on mars....and several more months to get back home. The entire mission would last at least a year.

We do have the technology but the cost of life support for a mission of that length is a lot.....just think about all the oxygen and food and resources required to sustain a small crew of astronauts for a year!

I don't think a mars mission is too far off, but it will take several decades to approve of such funding of resources.

Answer 5

there are plans to eventually send astronauts to mars......
but it takes time and money to build a proper ship that creates sentripical force, so the astronauts can have temporary gravity.....and also so the ship doesn't fall apart along the way :)
also it takes a very long time to travel to mars....so scientists have to figure out when the earth and mars are the closest in orbit, so the astronauts can spend less time in space.
Plus they would probably have to do some serious psychological testing....because the astronauts can also get some serious cabin fever.....if not just go plain nuts.
plus food....water....even fuel is a issue...........so there's a lot of work to do before we send someone to mars.

Answer 6

Well for starters it takes 3 pounds of food, 3 pounds of water and 6 pounds of air per day per person.

To put 4 people in Orbit around Mars would cost $75,000,000 just to put the consumables into space

Next you need a ship big enough to carry 4 people with enough space for them to walk (about the size of a Lear Jet maybe, which is several times larger than the cockpit of the Shuttle) and enough cargo room for 3 tons worth of food, water and air.

That would take a space ship about the size of a Boing 767 in internal room.

Then 4 people would be stuck in this ship for 90-100 days round trip just to orbit Mars for 2 weeks

To land them we'd need a lander with fuel and that would add to the size.

We are now talking about something the size of of a small boat and train with several box cars connected to it.

You'd basically need somethin the size or or larger than the Space Station.

The Space Station could be sent to Mars, that would be my choice.

You need to send dozens of shuttles up days apart to provide the food and water and we don't have the facilities to do that.

Answer 7

Money, time, technology, information.

Right now if we had 1 mission to mars where would we go? We have no clue. That is why we have 2 rovers up there checking it out. I am sure we have top places on our list but narrowing it down to a mass radius would be best for our astronauts to explore on mars for a mission. So we lack alot of information also.

Answer 8

Well we have not been to the moon in a long time so we need to get restarted and revisit the moon before moving on to Mars. If we continued to go to the moon instied of stoping we could have easily been to Mars by now.

Answer 9

Takes a long time to get to Mars. You would need enough food,water and oxygen, which none of the resources are naturally available in space. I think that's why we haven't landed on Mars.

Answer 10

It takes 3 whole years to get to Mars. We do have the technology to 'Mars-walk' but scientists are still checking and double-checking each aspect of Mars before they risk letting someone walk on it.