A Trip To Mars Only A Decade Away? Boeing, SpaceX Competition Will To A Head Soon?

As the race for Mars habitation heats up between Boeing and SpaceX, CEO of SpaceX, Elon Musk has announced that he will begin human habitation in Mars by 2025.

According to Forbes, Musk has expressed his intention to build giant rockets (the first possible named "Heart of Gold") capable of carrying 100 people at a time to the Red Planet. It is estimated that $10 billion in public/private money is required to finance this project.

 Despite the failure of Falcon-9, Musk is confident of reaching the Red Planet and revealed that new rockets have been tested already to prepare for the Mars trip ten years from now. Elon Musk expressed his goal to send one million people in the Mars colony by next 40-100 years.

As stated by The Indian Express, Musk is looking at making the travel more affordable by employing reusable rockets and boosters. According to Musk, the idea is to fly to Mars about every 26 months when the orbits of Earth and Mars are favourably inclined.

With SpaceX announcing their plans of mission first, they seem to have an advantage over their rival company, Boeing. However, Boeing does not remain far behind in the race. With their CEO, Dennis Muilenburg challenging Musk that the first person to reach Mars will be in a Boeing rocket, the pressure on SpaceX to live up to their plans has been building up.

 SpaceX has reportedly not been very good at meeting deadlines. In 2011, SpaceX had claimed that they would send people to space within the next three years. While this still remains elusive, Boeing has reportedly been receiving a funding of billions from the NASA.

Both the companies have been contracted by the NASA space agency to ferry astronauts to the International Space Station. Are you up for that trip to Mars?