Space Education and Strategic Applications Journal
Mars ’ ice caps , liberating enough water vapor and carbon dioxide — both potent greenhouse gases — to warm up the planet substantially , the idea goes .”
It ’ s been projected that it would take more than 10,000 nuclear bombs to carry out Musk ’ s plan . The nuclear bomb explosions would also render Mars radioactive . The nuclear bombs would be carried to Mars on the fleet of 1,000 Starships that Musk wants to build — similar to the one that blew up on December 9 , 2020 ( Figure 1 ).
Figure 1 . SpaceX ’ s Starship SNB prototype prior to exploding . Image courtesy of SpaceX AFP via Getty Images
Figure 2 : Image courtesy of SpaceX product website
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