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I believe the original plan was a Falcon Heavy carrying a Dragon equipped for propulsive landing. I believe they were actually going to use propulsive landing

I believe the original plan was a Falcon Heavy carrying a Dragon equipped for propulsive landing. I believe they were actually going to use propulsive landing instead of parachutes even for return to earth. That probably is eventually the answer but the risk just wasn't worth it.

Manabu-eo 2y ago
NASA didn't like the propulsive landing for return to earth, so this capability was not funded, and SpaceX wasn't interested in funding it itself only for this mars mission, so Red Dragon was scrapped.
- philipwhiuk 2y ago
  > NASA didn't like the propulsive landing for return to earth, Heh, and now it's back ;)