The Congress Just Passed the NASA Authorization Act of 2017. Their new mission? Get mankind to Mars ASAP!


Along with the act, the chambers of Congress established NASA’s budget for 2017 at 19.5 billion dollars. Is that enough to get things going?

Now I now there are hundreds of conspiracy theories about NASA and their hidden projects. A lot of whistleblowers claim the space agency has had a presence on the red planet for a while now, and they already established manned colonies out there. Let’s set aside these theories for a while and focus on the official information that is available.

Like all of us, NASA set its eyes on Mars a long time ago. But the Authorization Act of 2017 underlines the importance of getting there. In the 1960s, the goal of the space race was to get to the Moon. Now it’s Mars’ turn. This has become NASA’s main quest.

“Mars is the appropriate long-term goal for the human space flight program.” – Authorization Act of 2017

The document states that NASA needs to “get humans near or on the surface of Mars in the 2030s” and since nobody in their right mind would oppose this venture, the bill is expected to become law.

In order to get humans to Mars, NASA has to establish an “initial human exploration roadmap” by December 1, 2017. The Congress believe that in order to attempt the colonization of or next door neighbor we must first come up with “strategic planning and timely decisions.”

A human exploration roadmap should begin with low-Earth orbit, then address in greater detail progress beyond low-Earth orbit to cis-lunar space, and then address future missions aimed at human arrival and activities near and then on the surface of Mars.”

Lately, we’ve been hearing a lot about humanity’s plan to get to Mars, but the news came from private companies (SpaceX) and foreign space agencies (China and the United Arab Emirates). So it makes sense that the world’s most famous player stepped in.

With the way things are looking, stakes are higher than ever. Many feel like mankind’s only longterm shot at survival involves expanding our presence into the universe. We’re screwing our planet like never before so the need for an “Option B” is dire.

Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX aims to create a permanent settlement on Mars. An optimist to his core, Musk plans to land a human crew by 2025 but there are still a lot of details that his company needs to iron out before that happens. He is convinced the future of the human race lies outside of our own planet and this new act shows that the U.S. Government shares his sentiment.

There is a strong humanitarian argument for making life multiplanetary in order to safeguard the existence of humanity. – Elon Musk

In the meantime, NASA scientists haven’t been sitting around, idly twiddling their thumbs. They have several rovers on the surface of the dusty planet and they plan on sending another one in 2020.

The road needs to be well paved, otherwise they’d be sending a crew to their untimely death. The Martian might have outlined survival scenarios on Mars but Science Fiction has a fiction attribute that doesn’t guarantee success in real life.

Now let the conspiracy theories flow.