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The ambitious Mars One Project has gone bust

Credit: Mars One

Do you remember the Mars One Project? Well the start-up that hoped to finance a manned mission to Mars with a reality TV show has in fact gone bust.  Financial documents that were recently published online proves this to be the case. 

Too ambitious project

Have you ever dreamed about leaving Earth for new horizons?  This might soon become possible.  At least this is what the very ambitious Mars One Project proposed four years ago.The project was founded by the Dutch mechanical engineer Bas Landscorp.  The mission aimed to send 24 humans to Mars in March 2022 so that they could settle the first permanent human colony on the Red Planet.  The journey with no return was to be financed by a reality television channel. It was certainly an ambitious project but perhaps too ambitious.  Nothing went as planned and Mars One project has just gone bust!

A few months ago the start-up had already been divided into two companies. The non-profit Mars One Foundation and Mars One Ventures which had lucrative ambitions.  This second company has just recently gone bust.  The new was first announced on the Reddit site, where a user posted a link to the Swiss financial documents that stated the company was at the point of liquidation. Mars One which was apparently already preparing first unmanned mission in 2018, will never manage to see their ambition realised.

Mars One
This is what the Mars One base on Mars could have resembled. Credits : Mars One

Many challenges to overcome

If we want to reach Mars we will have to be patient for a few more years.  Although we still believe that humans will have a future on Mars, we need to remember that the Red Planet does not not welcome livable conditions. The environment on Mars is cold, dry and it doesn’t have the same gravity as Earth.  What is more the surface of Mars is bombarded with cosmic rays.  Our bodies have evolved on Earth under Earth conditions. It is not as simple as that to move our evolved species into such as hostile world.  Many more challenges will need to be overcome become before humans can journey to Mars.

We should really be asking ourselves some important questions. For example, is it really necessary to touch down on Mars?  According to David Weintraub, an astronomer from the University of Vanderbilt in the United States, the main agencies proposing Mars missions should confirm if life really exists on Mars before going ahead.  This is crucial as once the first foot has touched the planet it will be contaminated.

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