美億萬富翁宣佈年載人赴火星

Billionaire Dennis Tito, tired of being told that we can’t send humans to Mars just yet, on Wednesday revealed his scheme for launching two astronauts to the red planet as early as December 2017.

Dubbed “Inspiration Mars,” the flyby mission would exploit a rare alignment of Earth and Mars that minimizes the time and the fuel it would take to get to Mars and back home again. The astronauts would come within 100 miles of the Martian surface before being slung back to Earth.

“It would be a voyage of around 800 million miles around the sun in 501 days,” Tito testified Wednesday at a hearing of the House subcommittee on space. “No longer is a Mars flyby mission just one more theoretical idea. It can be done. Not in a matter of decades, but in a few years.”

Tito is a former engineer who made a fortune in investment management and, in 2001, became the first person to pay his way into space, buying a seat on a Russian rocket. Now he’s pitching Inspiration Mars as a national priority for the United States. Grab this rare chance to go to Mars quickly or risk seeing China or Russia get there first, he told members of Congress.

Tito mentioned a backup plan that would offer Inspiration Mars four more years of development time. Another alignment of planets in 2021 offers a second chance to go to Mars fairly quickly, but the journey would last 80 days longer and require that the astronauts fly much closer to the sun, within the orbit of Venus, in one portion of the trip. That would add to the already considerable radiation hazards.

When Tito broached the idea of Inspiration Mars early this year, he thought he could use primarily private rockets and minimize the need for NASA involvement. But the feasibility study led Tito back to NASA. NASA is building a jumbo rocket, the Space Launch System, that is supposed to be ready for its inaugural, uncrewed test flight in 2017. The second launch, carrying a crew in NASA’s new Orion capsule for the first time, isn’t scheduled until 2021.

Tito’s plan would essentially borrow the SLS for the Mars mission, if NASA agreed. And NASA would have to pay for a lot of this. Tito described Inspiration Mars as a “philanthropic partnership with government.” He said private donors would probably give about $300 million for the mission, and the government would need to provide about $700 million — in addition to the money NASA is already spending, under current programs, on rocket and spacecraft development.

NASA reacted coolly to Tito’s proposal.

“Inspiration Mars’s proposed schedule is a significant challenge due to life support systems, space radiation response, habitats and the human psychology of being in a small spacecraft for over 500 days,” spokesman David Weaver said in a statement. “The agency is willing to share technical and programmatic expertise with Inspiration Mars but is unable to commit to sharing expenses with them. However, we remain open to further collaboration as their proposal and plans for a later mission develop.”據《華盛頓郵報》11月20日報道，美國億萬富翁丹尼斯•蒂託當天宣佈，他的“靈感火星”計劃最早將在2017年12月實現，屆時兩名宇航員將乘坐載人飛船開啓探索火星之旅。

蒂託20日在美國衆議院航空航天小組委員會舉行的聽證會上說：“這將是一段長達8億英里（約合13億公里）、耗時501天的旅程。載人火星之旅不再是夢想，甚至無需幾十年，只要再等幾年就能實現了。”儘管不會登陸火星，但宇航員距離火星表面最近時在100英里（約合161公里）以內。

蒂託說，之所以選擇2017年，是因爲到時火星和地球將在一條直線上，能極大地縮短往返時間，並節約燃料。他還提到了一個備選計劃，即在2021年另一次類似機會出現時出發，但屆時宇航員將要在太空中多待80天，且由於更靠近太陽要承受更多輻射。

蒂託表示想和美國國家航空航天局（NASA）合作，包括借用NASA的“太空發射系統”（Space Launch System）。蒂託稱“靈感火星”是“與政府合作的慈善項目”，私人捐助者將資助3億美元，政府僅需再提供7億美元，當然這其中不包括NASA當前的各個項目以及研發火箭的費用。載人火星之旅成本極高，此前的說法是需要10到20億美元。

不過NASA對此反應冷淡。其發言人戴維•韋弗說：“‘靈感火星’計劃是個巨大的挑戰，要考到生命支持系統、太空輻射反應、居住環境和在小飛船裏待上500多天對人的心理影響。我們願與‘靈感火星’分享技術和計劃方面的專業知識，但不能承諾分擔費用。”

蒂託曾是NASA噴氣推進實驗室科學家，後來在加州成立了一家投資公司，賺了一筆錢。2001年，他花錢搭乘俄羅斯火箭飛上國際空間站，成爲人類歷史上首位“太空遊客”。