Manned mission to Mars still far away: Russian cosmonaut
MUMBAI: Mikhail Korneinko, Russian cosmonaut, who served expedition 43-46 as a flight engineer on International Space Station (ISS) with his counterpart Scott Kelly, an astronaut from The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said that a manned mission to Mars was still far away in the absence of clear objectives at the Nehru Science Centre, Worli, for Rosatom Festival of Science and Culture on Thursday.
The 58-year-old,however, believes that a manned moon mission can be done in cooperation between Russia, India, and China.
“We can reach Mars now, but do we want to spend billions of dollars to just put one leg on it?” said Korneinko, adding, “We are no more in the age where there is a fight between two super powers which had existed to reach the moon. Today we are in a new age where we need to understand from a pragmatic point of view on the need to fly to Mars.”
“At present, Russia and United States are developing heavy launch vehicles for manned moon mission; it will take 15 to 20 years. But cooperation between countries make space missions easier. If Russia-india-china put in joint efforts, it can take place in even lesser time.”
Korneinko along with hiscounterpart Kelly, have spent almost one year aboard the ISS to study the effects on the human body in preparation for the United States space agency’s mission to send an astronaut to Mars by 2030..