NASA intends to build on the reverse side of the moon base for launching spacecraft to the red planet

NASA intends to build on the dark side of the moon base that would be "a stepping stone to Mars". The project could start as early as 2017, writes The Daily Mail.

Manned station on the opposite side of the satellite will be, according to the calculations of American scientists, the starting point for a manned spacecraft that will run to the red planet. The distance from the base of the Land will amount to 277 thousand kilometers. For comparison, the ISS is flying at an altitude of 370 km from the surface of our planet.

Parking space ships will be in the specific modules EML-2. These modules use the libration effect - a slow oscillations of the orbit of the moon. Due to the balance of gravitational fields of the Earth and the moon EML-2 will be able to hang in the space between the planet and its satellite.

When the construction of the base NASA will have to solve a number of problems. First of all, researchers need to provide astronauts protection from radiation. A significant concern is the question of supply stations and ships to be sent to Mars.

For the construction of the station the U.S. space Agency is likely to use some modules, remaining in the construction of the ISS. According to NASA, the database location "on the other side of the moon as a test site to send humans into space and is the best opportunity to gain the necessary experience of flights and reducing the risks". Start the project, which, according to preliminary estimates, will have to spend about $3 billion a year, maybe in five years.

However, while the U.S. space Agency plans not approved in Washington. Now the Department is negotiating with the White house and the Congress. In this regard, NASA has other options for implementation of a flight to Mars.

"There are many options and routes. We are now looking for ways to easily and with minimal risk to get to Mars,," said NASA spokesman David weaver.

Let's remind, recently on the exploration of the moon's thought and the Russian authorities. Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, Russian scientists proposed to build a base on the satellite. This will give impetus to the development of the entire national space industry, he said. "We in space activities there is a big competition between countries, and should therefore be most supergoal, which will pull behind itself a science, the industry, which will allow the country to escape from the captivity of the problems that we're 20 years" - said Rogozin.

Russia, said Deputy Prime Minister, learned "to work in near-earth space in the absence of gravity". "Why not try to work in low gravity on the Earth's natural satellite? This problem is large, prestigious, political" - he said.