Current Issues:
SpaceViews
SpaceViews Update
Breaking News
Back Issues
Search
Subscriptions
Submissions
Forum
Space Sites of the Week
Home
Mars Pathfinder
Comet Hale-Bopp
Top Ten Stories of '96
Life on Mars?
Public Interest in Pathfinder Renews Hopes for Human Missions
The tremendous public interest, nearly all of it positive, in the Mars Pathfinder mission had renewed hopes among NASA officials, scientists, and activists, that public support will also grow for future, more expensive human missions to Mars.
![[illustration of human Mars habitat]](../970715/images2/marshab.jpg)
Discussion in the days following the Pathfinder landing included future plans for human exploration. Goldin said he is interested in plans that cost on the order of $20 to $25 billion and would be ready to go sometime after 2011.
Goldin told the Associated Press that he was interested in an international mission, "so Americans don't have to pick up the entire bill."
One impetus for such a mission might be evidence of past or present life on Mars. NASA associate administrator Wesley Huntress said, "If we were to bring back a rock in 2005 that clearly shows evidence of ancient life on the planet or if we were to find evidence of life on Mars, that would be great impetus for a human program."
The fact that the Pathfinder mission, adopting Goldin's and NASA's new philosophy of "better, faster, cheaper" by accepting more risk for a higher payoff at lower costs, may benefit future plans for human missions.
"The question is; how much risk is mankind willing to take to send a manned mission to Mars?" asked Pathfinder deputy project manager Brian Muirhead.
Not everyone is convinced a human mission to Mars is wise. Ralph DeGennaro, executive director of Taxpayers for Common Sense, told the AP, "Pathfinder should get the cheap government award, but sending humans to Mars is truly nutty."