Real Reason NASA Hasn't Sent Humans To Mars
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Published 2018-03-01
Its plans included building multiple space stations, continued trips to the Moon, and the first crewed mission to Mars by the 1980s. Can you imagine watching astronauts walk on Mars the same time the walkmen came out?
But NASA never sent humans to Mars in the '80s. And here we are 30 years later, still dreaming of the possibility. But the reason isn't necessarily a matter of technology or innovation. It actually comes down to politics.
As a government agency, NASA's goals are determined by the Executive Branch. Since its inception, NASA has served under 12 presidents. And it was clear near the start that not every president would support NASA equally.
By the end of Nixon's administration in 1974, NASA's budget had plummeted from 4% of the federal budget to less than 1%. Fully-funded Apollo missions 18 and 19 were abandoned along with Apollo 20.
At the same time, Nixon pulled NASA's focus away from the Moon and Mars and instead toward low-Earth orbit. His parting gift was to sign into effect what would eventually become NASA's Space Shuttle program.
Peter Diamandis: "So what's happened throughout all of space history after the Apollo program was over was to start, stop, start, stop, cancel. President comes in like Bush comes in to go to the Moon, back to Mars and next president comes in and cancels that. The agency is unable to sustain consistent funding to do anything."
It wasn't until the Space Shuttle Program was nearing retirement that a crewed mission to Mars was finally considered and funded by a US president.
George W. Bush, in 2004, announced:
"We will give NASA new focus and vision for future exploration. We will build new ships to carry man forward into the universe to gain a new foothold on the Moon."
As a result, NASA's Constellation Program was born. Never heard of it? That's because it was canceled a few years later. It aimed to send a crewed mission to the Moon in 2020 and land the first humans on Mars by the 2030s.
By the time Obama was sworn in, the Constellation Program was behind schedule and over budget. One year later, Obama canceled 100% of the program's funding.
"All that has to change. And with the strategy, I'm outlining today it will." -Barack Obama in 2010.
Obama shifted NASA's focus from sending people to the Moon and Mars to, ultimately, just Mars. In the process, he asked Congress to increase NASA's budget by $6 billion over the next 5 years.
As a result, NASA launched its "Journey to Mars" initiative in 2010, with the goal to send humans into orbit around Mars by the early 2030s. And, until recently, NASA was on track, more or less. Then, this happened.
“President Trump has launched the National Space Council and at the council’s inaugural meeting in October, we unanimously approved a recommendation to instruct NASA to return American astronauts to the moon and from there to lay a foundation for a mission to Mars.” -Mike Pence in 2017
Oddly enough, the space policy under Trump and Obama look nearly identical, save for 63 words. In those 63 words, Trump's administration has shifted the focus once again to a Moon-first, Mars-later initiative.
NASA isn't new to this. It's learned to recycle old projects to fit new missions. For instance, the Orion capsule was first developed for Constellation and has since been redesigned for the Journey to Mars.
But even that can't prevent the inevitable changes NASA programs now face under the new president.
"We're also going to realign the organizational structure to best meet this new exploration focus. I've asked Stephen Jurczyk the current head of space exploration to lead and effort to design a new organizational approach." -Robert M. Lightfoot, Jr. in 2018
As NASA pushes on, a new possibility has grown on the horizon. Privately-owned space companies like SpaceX also has its sights set on the red planet.
Diamandis: "The scientists and engineers at NASA are amazing and they've done extraordinary things. But they're risk aversion...That doesn't allow us to do new and novel things that are on the edge. Doing anything big and bold in space is hard and it's risky. So, it's entrepreneurs taking the risks these days, willing to put everything on the line."
The race for Mars is on. While NASA has closely partnered with SpaceX and other privately-owned space companies in recent years, ultimately, NASA may not be the ones who write the next chapter in human space exploration.
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All Comments (21)
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Scientists shouldn't be controlled by the government
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Bet if there was oil on Mars or the Moon there be a colony many years ago.
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We need to get a bunch of scientists to tell the government that there’s oil on Mars
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12 US presidents & 30yrs later ....and all we have to show is Neal Armstrong! “That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind!”
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Goverment: we are focusing on weapons and bombs. NASA: huh u dont want a place to live when you Explode Earth?
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It angers me that these scientists have to answer to the unstable pattern of the government.
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I can picture a world without war; a world without hate... And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it.
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it pains me to imagine my future generations to suffer and strive a new life on a completely different planet, because my generations and the past ones failed to protect our own.
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Send man to space not to war
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I wonder how much money was wasted after cancelling so many programs
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R.I.P spirit and opportunity. You will be missed. 😭
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NASA: We can't send humans to Mars. Elon Musk: Hold my Tesla
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Politics ruin everything good in this world, period.
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That's why we have Elon Musk that can't be controlled.
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It's so stressful to see NASA, one of the most unanimously loved public programs, fumbled like this by politicians over and over. The consequences of NASA fumbling & a private company having control over something as significant as space travel could be severe since space exploration will--one day--permanently change the landscape of humanity.
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It's possible we could have sent a rocket to orbit Mars and return to Earth 30-40 years ago, but that's about it. There are many issues that we still don't have an answer to today regarding Mars, let alone back then. We don't have a technology to safely land larger craft on Mars due to the thin atmosphere and don't have a technology to take off again. It worked for us on the moon because it has less gravity and less atmosphere so is much easier to land and take off with less thrust than would be the case on Mars. Mars also has frequent dust storms with toxic dust that would cover everything - all the equipment, supplies, space suits, you name it. We don't have an answer for that. Radiation risks both in space and on the surface - don't really have an answer for that either. Perhaps the biggest difference is that if anything goes wrong on the Moon, you have a chance to send help since it's so much closer. On Mars with current technologies or those from 30 to 40 years ago, anyone needing help would be on their own. The distances are so much greater and the technology demands and challenges are infinitely more difficult. It's like swimming from Cuba to Florida - challenging but it's been done (that's the Moon landing), versus swimming around the World without any places to land or refuel (that's more like landing on Mars and returning).
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Corrupt politicians is the reason
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People in 1969: We just landed on the Moon. Surely we'll be at Mars in a few years. People in 2019: It's been 50 years since the Moon landing! How have we not gone to Mars!?
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Nahhh just tell the us there’s oil there and the us will go there instantly
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They haven't found oil on it yet, if they do we'll be there drilling that year!
