Space experts worry that the United States does not reach Mars by 2030

RED PLANET. This computer-generated image represents a part of Mars at the limit between darkness and daylight, with an area including Gale Crater, which begins to take on morning light. NASA / JPL-Caltech

TAMPA, USA – The United States has promised to send the first humans to Mars in the 2030s, but space experts and lawmakers have expressed concern that Poor planning and lack of funds President Donald Trump has promised to send Americans to the moon for the first time since the Apollo missions of the 1960s and 1970s, building a lunar bridge to test technology and the spaceships that will transport humans to Mars.

At a hearing in Washington, Senator Bill Nelson stated that the White House's decision to return to the moon – a program that former President Barack Obama had stopped to focus on Mars – could slow down the process. We do not want to deprive NASA's budget of what is the goal, and the goal is to reach Mars with humans, "said Nelson, a Florida Democrat, who houses Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center.

"Do these missions help us achieve our goal? F bring humans to Mars? "He asked. (READ: A first lake of liquid water is discovered on Mars)

In 2009, an independent panel of experts known as the Augustine Commission warned that the resources of the NASA did not meet its ambitious goals

NASA would need $ 3 billion more per year to go to Mars.

NASA officials said this year they were trying to create a program deep space with much less, using only increases based on inflation.In the budget

the National Academies of Sciences have calculated that if the NASA budget continued on its current trajectory, "forget the scenario from the arrival of Mars in the 2030s. It will take us until 2050 ".]" I do not think we want to wait that long. "

Global Partners Concerned

In 2017, the project of lo Congress permission from NASA required NASA to define a plan for reaching Mars.

"We do not have this road map yet, it is 7 months late," Nelson said.

"What gives? Let's see the program to go to Mars and see where all this is."

Testifying at the hearing, Chris Carberry, executive director of Mars said that international and private partnerships could help the United States make it more affordable to reach Mars.

"Our international partners want us to lead," he told lawmakers.

"But they have concerns that we will continue to change direction, they are not sure we will follow the direction."

Even more, aerospace experts have identified a dozen technologies that "we need to start to work on almost immediately if we have the hope of landing on Mars in the 2030s, added Carberry

It includes the development of spacecraft that can survive the Difficult landing on Mars and landing quite gently, as well as the ability to get people out of the surface and back on Earth.It will take a long time to get there, said Carberry. bipartisan at NASA, he sees among legislators, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, a Republican who heads the Senate Subcommittee on Space, said he hopes the next congressional bill from NASA "This next Authorized by NASA, the hope is that it will go further and be more daring in its aspirations, "he said.

Cruz asked NASA's retired astronaut Peggy Whitson, who spent an American record of 665 days in space, for his views on what is needed for the # 39; future.

"The most important thing is the constancy of purpose," she replied. Have a vision that lasts more than one administration We must have a budget line that will support the goals and objectives we are trying to achieve. "-