[1]WASHINGTON: NASA has recently mapped out a plan to develop a human floating city above Venus in order to explore solar system’s most inhospitable planets.
NASA has been currently floating a concept that could one day see a 30-day manned mission to Earth’s closest planetary neighbor and eventually, the mission could involve a permanent human presence suspended above the planet, the CNN reported.
Known at NASA as HAVOC, High Altitude Venus Operational Concept, engineers and scientists at the Systems Analysis and Concepts Directorate at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, have been working on a preliminary feasibility study on how robots and humans could make a Venus mission a reality.
The study showed the mission would require less time to complete than crewed missions to other planets and could even be a practice run for a Mars mission.Venus has the advantage of being much closer to Earth. Its minimum distance to Earth is 38 million kilometers, compared with 54.6 million to Mars.
HAVOC has been envisioned as a multi-phase campaign and robotic missions would have to be sent to test technologies and better understand the atmosphere.
While NASA has no current plans to fund the concept, the Langley-based team continues its work with the hope the space agency could make the plan come to fruition within several decades.
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