What is the current plan to inhabit Mars? When will people live there?
There is no current mission planned to take people to Mars. While there are studies to look at doing this in the future, right now there is neither the money, nor the national enthusiasm necessary to do this. So it will almost certainly be 20-40 years in the future before any manned mission heads to Mars, and longer still until we actually start living there. Eric Christian SCIENTIST: Eric Christian, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center NOAA AND SPACE WEATHER QUESTION: What does NOAA stand for and what do you have to do with space weather? James and Thomas, Beers Street Middle School, Hazlet, NJ ANSWER: NOAA stands for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA is part of the Department of Commerce and we do lots of things related to weather of all kinds. If you ever watch the Weather Channel you will see data that NOAA collects. Actually, the group that I work with is called the Space Environment Center (SEC) and they have been around longer than NOAA itself. I believe that SEC
