Does anyone have any doubt that Mars will be the next space destination? NASA and several countries are targeting the Red Planet. So you rate the fastest way to get there. Since we are used to the flat image of the planets, one would think of a straight line journey. However, the room differs from what is displayed on a screen. So this alternative is suggested: Venus will be the way to Mars.
This is influenced by the gravitational support. The ships use the thrust of the planets to accelerate or stop. Voyager probes used the gravity of Jupiter and Saturn to accelerate and escape the solar system.
Savings are progress
Spacecraft fuel is limited. The bigger they are, the more fuel they need. “The fuel requirement increases exponentially with the mass,” writes Jatan Mehta on “Medium.com”.
The human mission to Mars is theoretically planned for the middle of the next decade. It would take years. The challenge is to build a light ship that meets survival needs. And that it doesn’t support lethal accelerations (which unmanned ships tolerate).
A group of scientists presented a proposal in the journal “Acta Astronautica”. He says the mission must fly over Venus to perform a gravity support maneuver. It can be used to examine something closer to Venus.
Noam Izenberg, a planetary geologist at Johns Hopkins University, comments on “Space.com”. “A flyby to Venus on the way to or from Mars” can be faster and cheaper. “Venus is the way to Mars,” Kirby Runyon said in this medium. He is a planetary researcher from the same institution and is a signatory to the proposal.
The long and the short way
There are two ways to get to Mars. Design a conjunction mission with Mars and Earth aligned and at a minimal distance. Or an opposition mission in which they are in opposite positions, but in which Venus can serve as an accelerator for the ship. The Venus’s gravity would save fuel, weight, and cost. A mission to Mars can only last a month. The other itinerary, on the other hand, would extend the mission to one and a half years.
The advantage of landing on Venus is that it would enable science. The surface of the planet is around 400ºC. There would be no descent, but real-time robot operations guided by astronauts. Without the signal delay and the technical limitations associated with doing this from Earth.
In Runyon’s words, “The crew could monitor surface rovers and ships in the atmosphere in real time. You would use virtual reality devices and a joystick. “
All of this could be much more than a dream as NASA plans a two-year mission. It is increasingly likely that Venus will be the path to Mars.
