Mars is a 4 foot ball that you'll have to draw in another way. First, put a large ruler out from the 8-foot ball and place a marker 17.6 miles away. Fun Fact … If you make this trip in the collapsed scale you'll be driving at the Speed of Light at a mere 132 miles an hour. Yet the closest star would in this compressed scale (other than our own) still be 4.3 years to reach at the speed of light of 132 miles an hour to cross the distance between your 8-foot ball and the nearest star 4,787,408 miles away … 273,012 times the distance to our own Sun!

But back to the scale drawing of the difficulties of going to Mars and the practical applications of going to the Moon first to develop and perfect and test technologies that will serve us well (the rescue effort to save astronauts on the Moon can be made in days … the rescue effort to save astronauts on Mars could take years) …

From that point 17.6 miles from a line leading to the 8-foot ball in your back-yard, first draw a circle with an 864.9 foot diameter (see the diameter to radius instructions above, public school graduates). If Earth were an 8-foot ball, the highest climb of the Space Shuttle on record being only 4.62 inches off this 8-foot ball, the size of the Sun would reach almost 3 entire football fields against that 8-foot ball of Earth, and they are separated by 8 minutes at the speed of light.

For the sake of argument just draw a circle 26.8 miles around the center of that 3-football width Sun, and now you have the orbit of Mars.

The point is, I have no doubt we could launch a mission today which could get humans to Mars. I must say I am totally astounded as someone who can't even get a cellphone built by Nokkia to last longer than a year, a computer drive built by Seagate or Sony to last more ahn two, or a car built in America by Chevy to last more than 3. I must say I find the fact the Spirit and Opportunity have done as well as they have is a remarkable feat, and an abberation of luck that is not fairly representative of our technological **** that comes with the "Made In The U.S.A." Label. Just pour money our way, the aerospace contractors say, and we'll answer the technological challenges.

No. Make Aerospace contractors personally and monetarily reliable when Astronauts die when living in the **** house they built for them to die in because of the "military-industrial complex" and maybe they'll get it right the first time …

… which by the way is the only time the astronauts will have to make it back alive.

So with extensive teardowns by missions, we can get the Shuttle Orbiters to last for decades, with a mere span of days a year of actual on-orbit use and a mere hour per mission in a stressful regimen. So far, no one at General Motors, Boeing, or the White House has convinced me we're ready to do what's important – and that is to get Mars Astronauts safely back to Earth. Anyone can get to Mars. Getting back is the hard part.

Somewhere along the way the aerospace contractors lost their vision for accountability and responsibility.

The estimation is that Earth-to-Earth Mars missions will last years. So far we haven't come up with a good reason to go to Mars, other than the fact that "because it's there." So put some footprints there in the dust, and then come back. Then what?

There are parts of the Rocky Mountains between Leadville and Aspen that haven't been explored yet by the footprints of Man. Of the 70% of Earth's surface that is covered by water, only a small fraction has been explored. I'm NOT against a manned mission to Mars, but I want everyone to know exactly why it is so important to go there. I'm not saying it is important, but equally so I'm not ready to say it is. We have learned so much for Spirit and Opportunity that I am duly impressed by our discovery of truth – the basic hope for all human exploration. I'm not sure that having humans there will give us a bigger or better picture. Admittedly, it would give Mars more news coverage, which is at the current time and century more important to the planet Earth than it is the planet Mars.

Most people don't even know it takes less power to get a craft to Mars than the Moon.
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If the Earth were an 8 foot ball, our moon would be a 2-foot ball in a mutual circle about 250 feet across, with the center of gravity closer to Earth and a center of orbit under the Earth, but not at the center of the Earth. Compared to a mere 250 feet away from Earth, Mars comes as close as about 6.7 miles (in the 8-foot scale of Earth) and only in the illusion of our minds is the Moon really between Earth and Mars most of the time. In fact, using the trajectory of the Moon's orbital speed as a "speed bonus," the optimum time to launch from the Moon for Mars would only take place about once a month. While in this scale Mars is as close as 6.7 miles, the average is more like 9 miles at closest point of approach. Yet when on the other side of the Sun, as Mars is at least once every 2 years or so, Mars is 44 miles away – in this scale where Earth is only an 8 foot ball and the moon is only a 4 foot ball. Astronauts on Mars, a 4 foot ball in this scale, would be out of contact with Earth unless someone places a well spaced relay satellite out there somewhere at an angle that could bridge communications around the line between Earth, the Sun, and Mars.

So the real question is … do we really need to go to the Moon as a waypoint between Earth and Mars? No. Anyone at NASA who says we have to do that isn't being intellectually honest. On the cosmic scale of the Solar System Earth and our moon are virtually in the same point in space.

So why would we want to go to the moon first? For practice and experimentation. The International Space Station was one important training environment for life aboard the type of vehicles that would slowly unwind out of our orbit to slowly spiral out to match the orbit of Mars. The "distance" comparison loses its value when one considers the trip will actually be much longer in statute miles given the rather soft unwinding of an independent orbit between Earth's orbit and Mars' orbit.

The point of going to the moon first is just to test systems in an alien playground that would actually strain equipment and techniques more on the moon than they would on Mars. If we can get the safety czars at NASA who still require Astronauts to seek Houston's permission to sneeze or flush the (usually inoperative) space toilet to lighten up a bit, we can give the human-technological pairing in an alien hostile environment a real test on the Moon, and only by doing this would any sensible human have the justified confidence that we can safely send a man to Mars, and then return him safely to the Earth. I don't think we're quite ready for Mars yet. I think we need to develop and test a few systems a little closer to home. And once we perfect such systems, then let's roll (to Mars).

Most people don't even know it takes less power to get a craft to Mars than the Moon.

If we can launch to Mars from earth orbit, then we should be able to shuttle to moon from orbit at lower cost than a moonbase and take whats needs from there. This makes Space station and shuttle technology the most important advancements for our fututrre exploration.

1: build a space lift to reduce cost by 50000%
2: build a large ship in sections on earth
3: send sections up with space lift
4: assemble sections
5: send ships on long voyages with manned crews

or the pipe dream that people dream about here

1: send hundreads of fueled rockets to the moon costing billions maybe trillions to set up a moon base

2: send fueled rockets to the moon

3: send fueld rockets to mars

pipe dream wont happen, what i do see happening is manned missions to the moon, probably to prepare for a manned mission to mars, but no outpost, nasa … no america cant afford it

Who are you to judge their knowledge of aspects of colonization of Mars .

The MIT Mars Homesteading Group is into fine details regarding this topic..

Dr. Buzz Aldrin and other Astronauts are members of many Space organizations and he in particular is seriously involved with the above ideas on the colonization of Mars…

and Chuck Lam labels him as only a space fixer upper and bus driver ?

Furthermore , if you all learn from History , the conservative estimates of what humans can or can not do are almost always wrong…

Humans probably migrated to Anerica by water before the path was taken from Siberia …
The Clovis civilization may have come by water from Siberia in 15000 bc or even Europe … their arrow heads found in Virginia are A SPECIFIC TYPE found only in Europe (france)

Today all kinds of water craft including Kon Tiki and rowboats are capable of crossing the oceans… there are always those daring explorers who will just get up and go … even on a log if necessary …

just as there will be those daring educated Astronaut types who will colonize MARS .

Many of them have Phd's !

There are and will be those who VOLUNTEER to go one way to MARS or anywhere for that matter , regardless of the risk..

In Holland , explorers were given a funeral before they left for America in the 15th century.

Vikings went everywhere …

In Peru , there are Indians who look like Japanese and some of there dialects are partially understood by visiting Japanese.

I know a physician from Ayacucho who looks Japanese and he believes that his ancestors came by boat from the Pacific area 30,000 years ago long before the Clovis people entered America.

In Merida in the Yucatan , one archeologist believes the Mayans came from India by boat in 4000 b.c.

A child was asked "Why should we go to Mars ?"
He replied "Because its there !"

You , with your condervative extimates of future progress are not in tune with History or Reality ,

You are obviously quite lacking in your judgement of others without doing a little background investigation as to their education and accomplishments in the academic and scientific area especially.

You must be only a bus driver yourself to make such foolish statements…

People like you never take risks … and risk is what its all about …

There are always risk taking explorer types and you can never hold them back …and thats the human spirit …

And , of course , there are always "Nay Sayers" and thats what many of you are all about…and you will push pencils in your little offices and be politicians and lawyers and such and be assigned behind the front lines where you don't have to take risks…and you will keep on saying endlessly "It can't be done " …

"The rest of you are not qualified to analyze this subject."

And nobody asked you for your unqualified opinion.

"Am I a nay-sayer? Yep, I am when considering mostly the economics and politics surrounding a colonization effort"

Well, to fathom the economical aspect of colonization, the following consideration could give a clue. To value the feasability of those projects on moon and mars one could value the involved companies and their stocks.

It is remarkable that the first privately owned spaceports are to come into existance. Private money all around the world already flows into their buildup in New Mexico, Oklahoma, Florida, Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Sandy Mines in Canada, Kiruna in Sweden. This is a very interesting indication. We see the cornerstones of a sound new economic activity.

Let me tell you what happens next. It is inevitable and nearly a law of nature that the used technologies will improve. Thus, the range of space tourism will increase from suborbital travel to orbital flights, and from there to flights one time around the moon. Then several orbits around the moon will become usual and at a certain moment in this development the first private trip to the surface of the moon will be made.

As soon as the subortbital tourism is established this development will be inevitable. The overall travel time will grow and so will the length of stay on ships and in space hotels and other establishments. It is foreseeable that the entrepreneurs will provide their "space products" with additional services. So additional staff will be on location. These men and women will stay in space hotels or at moon hotels for several weeks or month.

Among them will be doctors and medical staff. The first medical emergencies will occur and will be handled. And then there will be the first pregnant woman and the first birth away from earth. And if all goes well, this woman will become as famous as the biblical Eve.

"Permanently colonizing the moon or Mars is a pipe dream."

On the other hand, when we look back on our history we can't avoid to admit that our daily life is the best prove for the feasibility of the impossible.

They can see the big picture because of their backgrounds as test pilots , military combat experience and Apollo experience and education.

The rest of you are not qualified to analyze this subject.

The Moon will have to wait for the knowledge obtained from going to MARS first and by international commercial interests………….. like Space X.

THE MOON MUST COME FIRST!

the Chinese want the Helium 3 istopes that are abundant in the moon's regolith; this will NOT only save the Earth from dangerous politcal and envrionmental foissile fuels, but it will also pay for the scientific reserach….killing two birds with one stone.

once the phsyicists develop a reactor that can achieve about 70% energy efficiency with the Helium 3 isotope than it will become the most important element in the solar system..tHe russians already knew how to do this back in the 1950's, but since helium 3 does NOT exists on Earth in any significant natural quantities it never gained much attention; TOKAMAK

HELIUM 3

that's why need to go and do it fast before the world destroys itself over oil, and don't short term costs ruin long term thinking.

I agree Mr. Glenn. Using a the moon as a launch pad with current resources and technology is wasteful and foolish. Perhaps when we are at the point where we have re-usable vehicles for travelling w/n the solar system, but this is far off yet.

However, if building on the moon is for science and its resources, then I am all for it. Afterall, we need to perfect living on the moon, before we can perfect building huge projects on the moon.

The ISS orbits Earth maybe 15 times each day in a hight of about 400 km since ten years.
One orbit has a length of approximately

2*PI*6.800 km = 43.000 km
times 15 -> 645.000 km each day
times 365 -> 235.425.000 km each year
since 1998 -> 2.354.250.000 km

This are already more than two light hours. If the direction would have been different and the whole thing would reference a little bit more on itself, then it would now be beyond Saturn and in the path of Uranus.