Elon Musk has predicted the exact year humans will make it to Mars - and it's very soon

Elon Musk has given his estimation for when humans will land on Mars for the first time.

The first moon landing famously took place in 1969, but space enthusiasts have been debating when they think the first Mars landing will be.

Back in 2022, one X account called Space_Hub asked its followers for their guesses on when humans will first land on the Red Planet.

They tagged the platform's billionaire owner, Musk, to ask for his estimation and, if true, it won’t be too long to have to wait, as Musk replied: “2029.”

One person responded: “I am going to screenshot this, put a reminder, and see how it will be by then. See you in 2029.”

Another wrote: “In 2016 I bet a friend $10,000 that it’ll happen before 2031. Gonna be a photo finish!”

Musk has previously shared his vision of what the Mars landing could look like with a 5-minute animated “simulation” posted on SpaceX’s YouTube channel.

The video sees the company’s sleek looking Starship vessel and travelling through space to the Red Planet.

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When they land, the doors of the vessel open to reveal a futuristic human settlement on the planet in front of them.

Musk claimed in a tweet: “This will be real in our lifetime.”

However, he's since been more conservative with his answers, saying most recently at 2025 that 2031 would be "more likely" when it was to happen - although crew-less missions could come much sooner.

The billionaire has made it no secret that it is his vision with SpaceX to create a colony of humans on Mars with his Starship aircraft (the largest rocket ever created standing at 123m) which he hopes will transport 100 people at a time.

Musk hopes the Starship aircraft will be at least partially reusable and act as a commercial airline in its turnaround times.

"At an average distance of 140 million miles, Mars is one of Earth's closest habitable neighbors", a section on the SpaceX website reads of why they want to get there.

"Mars is about half again as far from the Sun as Earth is, so it still has decent sunlight. It is a little cold, but we can warm it up. Its atmosphere is primarily CO2 with some nitrogen and argon and a few other trace elements, which means that we can grow plants on Mars just by compressing the atmosphere."

The days on the planet are similar in length to the Earth, at 24 hours and 37 minutes.

Meanwhile, NASA have predicted that they could get to Mars by the early 2030s, should all go to plan.

Watch this space.

This article was originally published on 17 March 2022 and has since been updated

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