Russia plans to ride on a nuclear-powered spacecraft

The project to propel a spacecraft with nuclear power seems too ambitious from the word go itself. But that’s exactly what the Russian Federal Space Agency plans for. Backed by the Russian government, which has allocated about 17 million dollars for the environmentally conscious and feasible way to travel to the Red Planet, this project could be worth some $600 million.

nuclear powered spacecraft

It’s evident to think how, before we can take to Mars, because this nuclear propulsion idea could take a while. For this the Federal Space Agency promises to deliver the draft design of the rocket by 2012 and the functional model of the craft by 2018. The novelty of this spacecraft would not only be the nuclear power carrying it, but will be the engine as well, which in respect to the current chemical rocket engines that produce lethal power, is pretty clean and light.

The new spacecraft engine will let the craft use its own energy, without any external assistance, to move out of the Earth’s gravity and onto Mars, the power which in case of the present crafts is generated from the gravity of the other planets. Skeptics worn of dangers of nuclear power, citing the previous catastrophic incidents in space, but that’s not a deterrent, because Russians believes this is a step forward not only as a unilateral ambition, but a operative effort that other counties to could be a part of and the ways could be worked out for safety.

Image used for representation only Via: RT