WHAT ARE SOME OF THE DIFFICULTIES OF SENDING MISSIONS TO OTHER PLANETS AND WHAT QUESTIONS ARE YET TO BE ANSWERED BY SPACE SCIENTISTS?
Traveling between planets even has NASA’s brains tied in knots. Some missions to the moon have been a huge success, for example ( but others have been not so successful; such as the Beagle 2 which was sent to Mars but has not been heard from for years, and is now presumed lost.
Even though in films they make it look easy to travel to other planets, in real life is it extremely difficult. Here are some of the difficulties of sending missions to other planets:
Even though in films they make it look easy to travel to other planets, in real life is it extremely difficult. Here are some of the difficulties of sending missions to other planets:
- As the planet they are taking off from and the planet they are landing on are travelling at different speeds they have to adjust the speed they are travelling at. This happens because planets are not all the same distance from the sun; planets further away from the sun will travel faster than those closer to it. In addition if the planets are further away from the sun they will have to get past the force of the sun’s gravity.
- As well they will need a colossal amount of fuel because they are transporting a ship hundreds, millions or even billions of miles away from our planet (Earth).
- One of the main difficulties is managing the amount of energy for the whole ships velocity.
- At any time the spacecraft’s can be damaged by for example meteorites, and many of them are impossible to repair whilst in space as no-one is there to solve and fix the problem.
- Is there life on any other planets? We have been searching for years to see if there is life on Mars but it has still not been discovered. Even though we have created a huge amount of unbelievable technology if it will ever be discovered is still a mystery to me.
- Why is the Sun so hot? Scientists still don't understand why the sun's corona is so hot, as no objects can get close enough to it to find out because its gravitational pull is so strong and it will just be completely obliterated.
- What is Dark Energy? This is supposed to make up 73% of everything that exists, and still it can’t be seen or even measured. The energy is 'needed' find out lots of things about the universe, but may not ever be able to be discovered.