Introduction:
I think it's time for us to start thinking about space travel and what we can do to make it a reality. My problem with space travel has always been that it's just too far off in the future, but I know things are starting to change and there are people working on this every day. I am going to try to give you my best-educated guesses as to what is holding us back and why space travel is still so far away.
The topic of space travel is one that many people are interested in. I'm sure you've heard of the future of space travel, but are you aware of what's stopping us from going to these outer planets? There is no doubt that humans will be traveling far and wide in the future, but there are some things that could make our space journeys more successful than they are now.
What is stopping us from space travel?
There are several barriers to space travel, some of which are technical and some of which are political.
The first barrier is the technology necessary to launch a rocket into orbit and propel it safely away from Earth. The second barrier is the cost of such a rocket, which must be very large and very expensive if it is to carry enough fuel for a trip to Mars, for example. The third barrier is the space industry itself; there must be many people who would like to go into space but cannot afford it. And there are many other problems that need solving before we can start sending people into space.
But one of the most important things standing in our way is something that doesn't exist yet: a government willing to spend money on this research.
There are many hurdles and obstacles to creating a space-based economy. But the biggest barrier is that we don't yet have the technology to build a sustainable colony on another planet.
We have been talking about colonizing Mars for decades, but we have not even begun to test the technologies needed to launch humans into deep space or establish a viable base there. The problem is not technical: it's political. It requires money, lots of it, and political will from governments willing to spend their people's tax dollars on developing the necessary technologies.
The dream of going to Mars has been around as long as humans have been building rockets capable of making it there. So why is it still so hard?
There are many obstacles standing in the way of space travel, but here are the four most prominent ones:
1. Cost: A space shuttle costs $2B; a moon landing cost $100B. Even if NASA’s budget were infinite, there would still be a huge gap between what it can afford to do and what it wants to do. The best way to close this gap is by selling off NASA’s assets and focusing on technology development, but this would require Congressional approval and could take years. So while NASA may have an infinite budget, it doesn't necessarily have an infinite timeline.
2. Technology: Spacecraft have been designed to survive reentry into the atmosphere and return to Earth safely, but they can't survive reentry into orbit or any other planet's atmosphere without an orbital maneuvering system (OAMS). An OAMS is essentially a rocket that allows spacecraft to change their orientation relative to Earth without having to be turned around like a toy top—it's built into most rockets today but not all ones will work in low-Earth orbit (LEO), so engineers need to develop new ones for space travel. This is one reason why we haven't gone.
Conclusion:
We have no idea where technology is going to take us, or if we'll ever get beyond this little rock hurtling through space. But maybe we're not meant to travel so far, and maybe such a trip is impossible in the first place. It's fun to ponder, but we should probably remain grounded for now.
The biggest bottleneck in space travel doesn't necessarily have to do with the technology itself. It's the fact that we simply don't have government or private "missions" to deal with all of the possible issues that might arise on such a journey. Such missions would address these problems, conduct all sorts of experiments, and one day, a group will choose to send up some people to colonize Mars. But until then: no one is ready for Mars.