NASA planning plane bound for Mars
WASHINGTON (AP)
- To mark the 100th anniversary of the Wright Brothers
first airplane flight NASA wants to duplicate the event
- sort of - on Mars. The NASA budget for 2000 contains
$50 million to begin development of a Mars airplane.
An animated video played at the budget briefing showed a
small, pilotless plane parachuting toward the sandy surface,
unfolding its wings and propeller, and puttering off. In
actuality, a lot about the plane remains to be determined,
including actual design and means of propulsion and delivery
to Mars, NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin said.
Flying in Mars' atmosphere is like flying at 100,000 to
130,000 feet altitude above Earth, he said, so much research
needs to be done. A long-range jetliner flies at about 30,000
feet altitude. There is also an eight-minute time lag for
radio messages between Earth and Mars, complicating the
control of the plane, which would be unmanned. The goal,
if all goes well, is to make the flight in 2003, the 100th
anniversary of the Wright Brothers flight, though NASA's
briefing papers admitted it could slip to 2005.
