A few decades ago space exploration was spurred on by intense rivalries between
the United States and the Soviet Union propelled by the eminent fear that if
one side ever relaxed today the other would be launching missiles tomorrow but
nowadays it seems that space exploration is spurred on by the ego of billionaires
tweeting at each other but hey as a lover of space travel I'll take what I
can get so anyways massive fortunes and egos aside let's try to figure out who's
gonna be the first to get humans to Mars
let's start with the obvious who are our contenders as of now the only government
agency in the running is the u.s. is National Aeronautics and Space
Administration fancy title but we're just gonna call them NASA for short as
it stands it doesn't look like any other countries are close India's space agency
is just getting off the ground both literally and metaphorically the Russian
Rose cosmos and the European Space Agency's drink plan to send a rover to
Mars next year is facing great concern that it won't be ready in time for
launch and sending a Rover is nowhere near the complexity of a manned mission
and the Chinese national space agency is busy focusing on its own planned Mars
rover launch in 2020 but just because it takes a few billion dollars to fund a
space agency doesn't mean it's got to be limited to a bunch of bureaucrats the
biggest commercial space organizations are Elon Musk's SpaceX Jeff Bezos Blue
Origin United Launch Alliance Boeing and a handful of defense contractors who
don't seem very interested in peaceful space exploration so we won't be talking
about them much so what are all their plans well starting with the OGS NASA
plans to land astronauts in the mid 2030s after sending Rovers and base
components from 2020 to 2024 to support the Martian landing and do a practice
launch sending four astronauts somewhere between Earth and Mars by 2025
SpaceX the most ambitious of the bunch hopes to land the first humans on the
red planet in 2024 using the starship and bfr rockets currently in development
after a flyby of the moon in 2023 Blue Origin hopes to beat SpaceX they're
aboard new Glen their first orbital rocket
development but it isn't even scheduled to make its opening debut until 2021
Boeing ula and all the defense contractors aren't as concerned with
all-out personal glory and are only making it to Mars if NASA chooses them
to carry their astronauts so why are all these launches planned so many years in
advance well you can't just pop off to Mars whenever you want at least not if
you want to do it efficiently at current rocket speeds it takes about five to
seven months to make it to Mars launching at a very specific window that
lines up the optimal orbits of Earth and Mars launching any other time would take
a lot longer requiring more fuel and food and increasing the risk of a cosmic
disaster like a solar flare hitting the spacecraft the trick is that this launch
period is very specific it only comes every two years and only lasts for about
three weeks on top of that there's only about a one-hour period each day that
you can launch miss that window either because of a problem with your rocket or
maybe there's just too many clouds in the sky and you have to wait another two
years so the nix launch windows are in 2020 when NASA and the Chinese national
space agency plan on sending their Rovers to Mars 2022 when at least two
bfr cargo vehicles are planned to make demonstration landings on Mars and the
first real landing window in 2024 so who's gonna get there first as the
reigning champs of space exploration NASA has decades of experience in space
exploration and pulling off landings on Mars let's not forget they're the only
ones to actually land humans on another world and they did that before most
modern computer computation was even invented but to make it to Mars first
you need determination during the Cold War the Soviet provided the driving
force but now there's less motivation and funding budgets can dry up with each
passing administration and be broken down between NASA's numerous missions to
lead in space exploration you need to be driven and while NASA has always been
driven the general public that funds it cares a lot less so while there's a good
chance NASA can make its plans to land in the 2030s that does open up the
window for someone to beat them their first sadly that lowers the chance
Boeing ula and the private defense firms will land humans first at least of those
three Boeing as the Lord contractor for the first stage of NASA's
giant Space Launch System is in a better position than the rest to be chosen
although Blue Origin gets a billion dollars every year in funding from Jeff
Bezos selling Sauk and Amazon it has a lot fewer accomplishments than most
people realize it's talked about a lot but their first commercial orbital
rocket the new clan won't even make its opening launch for another two years
while Blu origins new Glen will likely be a great rocket far more advanced than
what got us to the moon in the 70s they're basically where SpaceX was in
2008 a decade ago when they were first developing the Falcon 9 at a certain
point it's just too much of a gap to overcome and still be first
lastly fuelled seemingly by Musk's own determination is SpaceX I want to show
you a graph on the y-axis we have the cost per launch on the x-axis the
maximum payload in simple terms the further to the right and the further
down a dot is the better and more cost-effective that rocket is here's
every major rocket launched before 2017 and here are all the ones since 2017
here is the Delta 4 used by the United Launch Alliance and
Atlas 5 developed by Lockheed Martin here is the Russian Soyuz rocket used by
NASA and other space agencies to get humans and cargo to the International
Space Station now here is the reused Falcon 9 rocket obviously being able to
reuse it lowers its launch cost it's undeniably one of the best rockets on
this list but there's still a handful Meerut but way out here past all the
rest is the Falcon Heavy no other rocket even comes close SpaceX has pushed the
needle far beyond what has been done and even what is still being done Elon Musk
has even offered to share building details for the Falcon rockets
schematics that most aerospace companies would guard with their lives because he
says any company trying to copy what their rockets currently are will be left
in the dust by the fast pace of their R&D divisions SpaceX is currently in the
development of the starship what they hope will be the rocket to carry the
first humans to Mars and with his motivation as CEO mixed with deep
investor pockets he seems poised to do so and SpaceX itself is deceptively
unprofitable it makes millions on every launch makes to send satellites into or
and restock the ISS and it is one of the best safety records of any aerospace
company the only reason it looks unprofitable on paper is because it
turns around and invest billions into its R&D divisions to keep advancing its
rockets obviously it's hard to predict the future especially for a finish line
that looks to be a decade away many companies even high-profile ones have
run out of money long before they could achieve their ambitions but SpaceX being
privately held shields them from investors who don't want their money
being wasted on something like advancing the human race so for now we get to sit
back and watch beautiful endings like this until one day we get to see them on
Mars