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How many robots could you send with the same budget (both financial and mass) required for a human mission? If a rover can do 5 days worth of human science over
by jjk166 6y ago
How many robots could you send with the same budget (both financial and mass) required for a human mission? If a rover can do 5 days worth of human science over its liftetime, and a human mission would take 100 Billion over the course of the program to send 100 tons (approximately the cost and weight delivered to the lunar surface of the apollo program) then you could do 500 days of science, which is approximately what the human mission would be capable of. That's with less risk to human life and much more flexibility.
- valuearb 6y agoA NASA manned Mars mission would cost far more than $100B, because they will require transporting all fuel for return trips, and each pound of fuel will cost over $100,000 to send to Mars using cost plus contractors, ie the SLS. And that’s likely only to land a half dozen astronauts. A SLS can only accelerate 25 tons of payload to Mars intercept orbit, which means at max 10 tons to the surface.. A Mars Direct like mission, as SpaceX is planning for Starship, will send hundreds of astronauts to Mars for less than $10B by leveraging in-orbit refueling and in-situ fuel generation. Using in-orbit refueling each Starship is designed to land 100 tons of crew, supplies and equipment on Mars.