Special Reports

SpaceX Mars Exploration Now A Go? Elon Musk Now Included In Donald Trump’s Business Council: What Could This Mean For NASA

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SpaceX's CEO Elon Musk is now a member of President-elect Donald Trump's business council. Musk is joined by Travis Kalanick, CEO and co-founder of Uber and Indra Nooyi, PepsiCo Chairman and CEO. Together with other business leaders from different industry, the team aims to give input when President-elect Donald Trump takes office on January 20, 2017.

SpaceX rescuing NASA

After the announcement was made, reports that there's a possibility that Trump's administration is not going to approve NASA's mission to send a spacecraft to land on an asteroid. Once it landed, it needs to pick some boulders and drop some boulders into the lunar orbit. This is known as the Asteroid Redirect Mission or ARM.

Others may find this quite absurd but rumors are suggesting that NASA's real agenda is space mining. NASA believed that space mining is more profitable than a travelling to Mars. NASA said that ARM is a necessary mission for them to test new technologies and processes before proceeding to a more complex mission, Inverse reports.

If NASA's ARM is not going to pushed through, SpaceX could provide a way for NASA to continue their research and exploration in space.

SpaceX versus NASA

According to Space, NASA is not planning to share resources with SpaceX. NASA is not willing to even put their equipment when SpaceX launch its first mission to Mars in 2018. They want to wait if SpaceX can really do land a space shuttle on Mars.

Jim Green, head of NASA Planetary Science Division, expressed that they understood the risks of any space exploration and they are not willing to take commit equipment that cost millions of dollars. SpaceX dubbed the mission as the Red Dragon and the main mission is the test landing on Mars with heavier cargos. This mission, if successful, can help open up the possibility of human settlement in Mars.

Green expressed that they do wish SpaceX success. SpaceX success can be beneficial to NASA in the future.

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