It is often discussed how lunar preparation will be a key stepping stone to get to long-term human habitation on Mars. I disagree, I believe that a straight-shot to Mars, with careful pre-preparation and a limited risk scope of exploration/ surface experiments will give us the best shot at near-term colonisation.
There is some excellent material from NASA in this week related to their SLS heavy launch platform, aimed at putting humans on the Moon again. It was impressive to see NASA's most powerful launch system in action.
This orbital launch equipment is designed to get humans to the Moon as part of the Artemis mission. Certainly the capability of the rocket system is enough to get humans to Mars - with 2 million lbs of thrust, these rockets will help get humans, cargo and modules off Earth in one shipment.
The core of these rockets, the RS-25 engines from Aerojet Rocketdyne are designed to deliver 512,000 lbs each. 4 of them are mounted to the underside of the rocket in a foursquare formation. See below some excellent footage from their Mississippi testing centre.
I think, reading between the lines, that the focus of NASA to achieve some concrete near-Earth exploration goal is driven more by the capacity for innovation. This is reflective of the complexity and fragmented nature of the organisation, with some 1000 suppliers. in this way, NASA can be likened to a sea-going tanker, taking time to gather momentum, pivot and manoeuvre.
This isn't the way of a fast-moving start-up. But it can offer some assurance about delivery (albeit late delivery). Some evidence of this can be seen in the shuttle-era derived solid rocket boosters. This is old technology - the Shuttle series was initially deployed in 1981 - some 40 years ago.
It is no small matter that a pair of these solid boosters are capable of 3 million lbs of thrust. Two similarly-designed solid fuel boosters will adorn the sides of the SLS system, they will provide much needed thrust to lift the hopes of human exploration and significant payload beyond Earth orbit.
Consider this - the Starship, Superheavy combination is also capable of leaving Earth orbit, eventually intending to reach Mars within 5 years, possibly 3. There is no plan, aside from the Artist Lunar exploration mission in 2024, to use the Starship as a Lunar exploration platform exclusively.
Viewed in this way, we can see that the launch capability piece is not holding us back. Even with the Starship landing arrangement - safe arrival can receive a high likelihood of success. However, the main issues which hold back such a mission are ensuring the right preparation and suitable habitation are available for the crew mission when they arrive.
Ultimately, the challenges that would face us on Mars would also face us on the Moon, albeit the moon is much closer. Having said that, if mission critical set-backs were to strike, the mission team would be on their own in either case, except on Mars, being much further away. So we may as well prepare as best we can and shoot for Mars first. Additionally, any challenges solved for Mars could be equally applicable to the Moon mission roster planned by NASA.
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