Posted on 10/09/2017 10:48:03 AM PDT by Red Badger
After thirteen years of development and setbacks — including a fatal crash, technical difficulties and frequent delays — Richard Branson's private space program, Virgin Galactic, is soon ready for live action, at least according to Branson himself.
“We are hopefully about three months before we are in space, maybe six months before I’m in space,” the founder of Virgin Galactic, which is part of Virgin Group, told an audience at Nordic Business Forum in Helsinki, Finland last week.
When he received an audience question about who will reach Mars first, he or Elon Musk, Branson made clear he is not as keen on the red star as SpaceX and Tesla's founder.
“I’m not as passionate about Mars as Elon is. My love for space is about how much it can do for people back here on earth, and that’s what Virgin Galactic is pushing towards.”
Elon Musk recently said he plans to land his first rockets on Mars by 2022, with his SpaceX program.
“[Getting to Mars] is an incredible challenge, and I suspect Elon [Musk] will get there first. He’s more interested in big rockets going big distances. We’ve been more interested in talking people to space, and satellites, slightly closer to earth,” Branson said.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
The moon should come before Mars. Distance alone makes Mars exponentially more difficult.
Wonder what he's got in mind that will help people. Also wonder what Musk has in mind with a Mars landing if anything other than the challenge and adventure which is pretty tremendous.
For what purpose?
The moon is a good place to work out the glitches, where you are just a three day ride to safety. On the other hand, it can also be a way of endlessly delaying Mars.
So maybe Branson can go after the Moon, while Musk goes after Mars. And NASA focuses on unmanned planetary visits, which is also a good way to develop skill sets.
It has been theorized that people with heart problems will heal faster and live longer in space environments..............
Moon colony first, then Mars......................
A staging area. A way to incrementally develop technology.
Unless you’re planning on going to Mars and then waiting another fifty years to go there again like we did with the moon.
With our money, of course.
we need both types of dreamers.
Taking money out of your pocket and mine, and giving it to people who hate us. All the while skimming a nice chunk for himself.
Hopefully his test-pilot is more on the ball this time. I don’t have much faith in that vehicle after seeing the airborne crashup derby they did last time. That plane is roly-poly. It sure wasn’t designed with stability in mind.
Mars belongs to the U.S. Proof? Sheila Jackson Lee told us that our astronauts planted the flag there.
5.56mm
I don’t care who claims Mars. I just wish Branson would take Hillary with him! And leave her...
After seeing the he and Obozo are boyfriends, he’ll get nothing from me.
Not from what I have read. Muscle atrophies in weightless and very low g environments. They cant work around this problem even with exercise and supplements. Circulation also has issued and radiation is always a problem.
If they can survive the acceleration of getting into space.
Well, yeah, there’s that problem.........................
The gravity well for the Moon is much smaller than the Earth’s.
Escape velocity..........................
The Moon or Mars who cares Imma gonna go to Recall
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.