Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX, Tesla, PayPal, SolarCity, HyperLoop, etc. recently unveiled his plan to colonize Mars using huge new rockets that his company is developing and building. The company's ambitious goal is to have people on the Red Planet within the next decade and to be running missions to and from the planet regularly to establish mankind as an interplanetary society.
Musk's plan to fund this endeavor is very clever as it provides utility here on earth. The company is looking into launching rockets from platforms just off shore of big cities to transport people long distances in very short amounts of time. Traveling from New York to Tokyo would take about half an hour. The company would also continue to make money from NASA launches and contracts with private companies. Musk believes that it would take collaboration between the government and private companies to make this happen, but plans to follow through with his plan as long as he can find the funding.
Whether or not his plans work out, I personally am a huge fan of SpaceX and its plans. As we have seen with NASA, government funded space travel is not sustainable or sensible. The only viable space travel, in my opinion, is privately funded. Even if the SpaceX vision fails, it is great to see companies and individuals working toward a common goal of extending the reach of humanity.
If the missions to colonize Mars do work, they will establish a small permanent base on the planet which will hopefully grow into a small city. Although the company has not planned for this or devoted much of its budget toward this goal, Elon Musk personally hopes to have a million people on the planet by the end of the century.
If given the opportunity, would you go to Mars?
I sure wouldn't, although I's love to see others go.
Be sure to UPVOTE, RESTEEM, and FOLLOW!
--Aaron