Want to travel to mars? That'll be $500k please!

A Saturn V rocket - Reliable fellow! (Courtesy - NASA) 

Short change isn't it? That's what the SpaceX CEO thinks anyway. He says that the 'average' person would be able to travel to our red neighbour and back for that 'small' amount by 2015 or 2020 at the most. SpaceX is a private organisation that's been recruited by NASA to help build commercial flights and shuttles to enable the haulage of goods and crew from Earth to International Space Station (ISS). SpaceX have already built a rocket called the Falcon 9 which will implement completely reusable technology such that nothing gets wasted as with the case of NASA's Saturn V rockets (now decommissioned) that jettison off different levels of the rocket at different stages of ascent. This would mean that only fuel would be a factor in the cost for the traveller. 2013 has been marked on the SpaceX calendar for a scheduled test launch of their Falcon 9 rocket. Currently, a Dragon class shuttle built by the same company has hurtled back from the ISS carrying a heavy payload of completed experiments by the boys orbiting around earth.

The Dragon Shuttle leaving the ISS (Courtesy - BBC/NASA)

With regards to landing on Mars, NASA themselves are nowhere near to setting a specific date and many speculate that NASA will attempt for Martian landing in the early 2030's. I'd like to see that happen, considering that my childhood was all about the stellar heavens and astronauts.