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Making predictions has been one of the most classy assignments of this era but do you know that in 1948 when it was not that fashionable, Wernher von Braun, a German-American aerospace engineer and rocket physicist had predicted that ‘Elon’ will thrust humans into Mars.
The prediction was made in his science-fiction novel named ‘Mars Project‘. Surprisingly, Elon Musk, who rarely interacts with followers was told about the prediction by a user. Musk interacted with a user this time and responded with: Are we sure this is real?
Are we sure this is real?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 30, 2020
The concept was elaborated by another Twitterati who said that Elon was not the name of the leader who would take humans to Mars and instead was just a title of the position, like an elected meritocratic president.
Nonetheless, even if the prediction was about a position named Elon and not an individual named Elon, it is interesting to note that the groundwork for such has already been laid.
For the prediction to come true, Elon Musk has been toiling hard. The entrepreneur, who is onto new heights of fame, success and money has been advocating to make life multiplanetary.
“You want to wake up in the morning and think the future is going to be great – and that’s what being a spacefaring civilization is all about. It’s about believing in the future and thinking that the future will be better than the past. And I can’t think of anything more exciting than going out there and being among the stars,” says Elon Musk.
Under the grand scheme, Spacex envisions that together the Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy rocket create a reusable transportation system capable of on orbit refueling and leveraging Mars’ natural H2O and CO2 resources to refuel on the surface of Mars.
Although Musk has set his eyes on sending humans to Mars, he admits that a bunch of people probably will die in the process adding that no one would be forced rather volunteers would go to Mars out of free will.
This comes at a time when ‘Ingenuity’, a small robotic solar helicopter operating on Mars as part of NASA’s Mars 2020 mission successfully completed the first powered controlled flight by an aircraft on a planet besides Earth.
Eventhough efforts are undereay to explore Mars, certain climatic conditions might delay the process. For example, Mars has bone-chilling temperatures, with nights as cold as minus 130 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 90 degrees Celsius) and to suatain electronic equipment and humans at that temperature is a tough nut to crack.
The success of Ingenuity would open up new avenues of research for scientists and engineers who are determined to send more robotic flying vehicles and also humans to the Red planet.
Let’s wait till Elon , be it a title or a human takes other fellow beings to Mars.