• Question: will we ever be able to go further than mars.

    Asked by josh241 to Christine, Edd, Jess, Nicolas, Zara on 16 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Jessica Chu

      Jessica Chu answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      Not people but NASA have sent spacecrafts (called Voyager) further than mars.

      Check out this NASA website:
      http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/

      It has mentioned that “Voyager 1 completed its planned close flybys of the Jupiter and Saturn planetary systems while Voyager 2, in addition to its own close flybys of Jupiter and Saturn, completed close flybys of the remaining two gas giants, Uranus and Neptune.”

    • Photo: Edward Codling

      Edward Codling answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      Hi josh – a great question!

      I think we have the technology now to send people further than Mars – we have satellites that have travelled out of our own galaxy as Jess mentions above.

      However, with the current space missions we have to travel somewhere that we know the astronauts can get back from – this limits the distance we can travel. Mars is a definite possibility but it would take about 2 years to get there and back – there are people training and studying the effects of a long mission like this even now:
      http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Mars500/
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MARS-500

      If we knew there was a habitable planet outside our solar system then it may be possible to send people there – as long as they were happy that they wouldn’t be coming back! Because of this we would only send people if we know they would definitely be able to survive once there. Also the original people who set out wouldn’t be the ones who would arrive – it would be their children and descendants because the distances and the time taken are so great.

      I think we need to invest in space exploration more though as our own planet is heavily overpopulated and we are running out of natural resources.

    • Photo: Zara Gladman

      Zara Gladman answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      With technologies advancing so quickly, I think that yes – one day, humans will be able to go further than Mars! 🙂 I hope that I’m alive to see it happen!

    • Photo: Christine Switzer

      Christine Switzer answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      Great answers already! We have sent probes far into our solar system and I think people will follow eventually. I hope it’s in my lifetime!

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