Capstone Essay Man has longed pondered about our spot in the cosmos; wishing for a chance to explore the heavens, they have built fantastic machines capable of launching the lucky few whose wish had been granted. Some of the lucky few explored our closest cosmic neighbor the moon, while the others never made it out of earth’s orbit. To some, the fact that the United States went to the moon in the late 1960’s and never returned after their scheduled missions was a strip-tease of almighty proportion. To make matters worse NASA not only did not return to the moon, but instead focused their resources, time, and effort on the space shuttle program. Which was considered by many to be a failure, however, now with the help of the private sector the
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Which means NASA is obligated by law to auction off cargo and manned mission contracts to the private sector so that America has a healthy space program that is capable of safely driving down costs for the consumer, while maintaining the integrity of NASAs’ primary goal which is the development of technology and science. SpaceX is one of the biggest players in the aerospace private sector and they have developed a plan to stay that way. In September 2016 Elon Musk announced his companies plan to colonize Mars by 2030. The companies plan is revolved around his freshly engineered Inter-Planetary Transport System (ITS), which uses forty-two brand new Raptor methane-fueled rocket engine, which has an enormous amount of power --3,050 KN at sea level to be exact—and is highly fuel efficient.
It should be mentioned that the Inter-Planetary Transport System is eleven meters taller than the Space Launch System currently being developed by NASA and can also lift 3 times more weight to low-earth orbit (LEO) than NASAs’ Space Launch System. To further exemplify SpaceX’s technological superiority over NASA the Inter-Planetary Transportation System is reusable and can land it-self back on the same launch pad it initially took off from. Unlike the Space Launch System which is expandable requiring it to be recovered and rebuilt before launching …show more content…
Yes, the plan is to settle their, but having the ability to go back at a moment’s notice is crucial for the safety and longevity of the colony. SpaceX and NASA realize this, and are developing plans to produce refined oxygen, hydrogen and methane from the abundance of water ice on the surface of Mars. Colonists will use those elements as rocket fuel in their raw form, the refining of those elements will be done automatically, allowing any of the colonists to produce the fuel; which in turn lets the more knowledgeable colonists focus on more important things such as expanding infrastructure or conducting field
Which means NASA is obligated by law to auction off cargo and manned mission contracts to the private sector so that America has a healthy space program that is capable of safely driving down costs for the consumer, while maintaining the integrity of NASAs’ primary goal which is the development of technology and science. SpaceX is one of the biggest players in the aerospace private sector and they have developed a plan to stay that way. In September 2016 Elon Musk announced his companies plan to colonize Mars by 2030. The companies plan is revolved around his freshly engineered Inter-Planetary Transport System (ITS), which uses forty-two brand new Raptor methane-fueled rocket engine, which has an enormous amount of power --3,050 KN at sea level to be exact—and is highly fuel efficient.
It should be mentioned that the Inter-Planetary Transport System is eleven meters taller than the Space Launch System currently being developed by NASA and can also lift 3 times more weight to low-earth orbit (LEO) than NASAs’ Space Launch System. To further exemplify SpaceX’s technological superiority over NASA the Inter-Planetary Transportation System is reusable and can land it-self back on the same launch pad it initially took off from. Unlike the Space Launch System which is expandable requiring it to be recovered and rebuilt before launching …show more content…
Yes, the plan is to settle their, but having the ability to go back at a moment’s notice is crucial for the safety and longevity of the colony. SpaceX and NASA realize this, and are developing plans to produce refined oxygen, hydrogen and methane from the abundance of water ice on the surface of Mars. Colonists will use those elements as rocket fuel in their raw form, the refining of those elements will be done automatically, allowing any of the colonists to produce the fuel; which in turn lets the more knowledgeable colonists focus on more important things such as expanding infrastructure or conducting field