last week Russia unveiled a 30 year plan for a manned space program including missions to Mars.

The Russian space agency is hoping that its plan will become the basis for a broader international effort to send people to Mars and build a permanent base on the moon.

Russia intends to go directly to Mars unlike NASA, who's plans are to use the Moon as a base to launch a Mars mission.

Officials at the Russian Space Agency have said that they are hoping for broad international cooperation as they would be unable to afford their ambitious goals on their own budget alone.

Russia's plans on replacing its Soyuz transport ship with a larger vehicle with a brand-new rocket to launch it. With the new technology they would be able to carry cosmonauts to the Earth-orbit space stations but also support missions to the moon and even expeditions to Mars.

Roskosmos approved both projects for development in spring 2009, while preliminary studies into the program have been in progress since around 2006.

Full Article [External Site]

No one has left any comments yet

Click Here to comment on this story