NASA is studying an extremely ambitious manned mission to Venus. Because of the hellish conditions at the surface of the planet-- high atmospheric pressure and extremely high temperatures-- humans actually landing on Venus is out of the question for the time being, but robotics have advanced to such a state that rovers could operate in those conditions for an extended period of time. The problem is that running rovers on one planet from another planet is slow, difficult, and inefficient.
Therefore, the idea is to put astronauts in orbit around Venus and have them control the surface rovers in basically real time, therefore making the exploration faster and more efficient. A solar powered airplane is also being considered to explore the atmosphere and cover vast tracts of ground.
Manned interplanetary flight is many years away, but, against all assumptions, the first one could go to Venus, not Mars.
Friday, July 30, 2010
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