NASA invites public to be part of upcoming Mars mission

If not in person, NASA is giving everyone across the world an opportunity to send off their names to the Red Planet aboard its forthcoming Mars mission to take place in 2020, hence leaving a long-term record of their name on Mars.

In order to get the public engaged and pumped up about its Mars mission, NASA is inviting everyone to its ‘Send Your Name’ campaign where people can send their names to Mars aboard the space agency’s next-generation 2020 rover that will search for life there.

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“As we get ready to launch this historic Mars mission, we want everyone to share in this journey of exploration,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD).

All the names will be written on silicon chips and each name will only take up a space smaller than one-thousandth of a human hair. The aim here is to engage public to highlight missions involved with NASA’s journey from Moon to Mars.

In order to send names, people would have to fill out a short form asking their basic details and NASA would provide them with a ‘boarding pass’ and ‘frequent flyer points’. The name submission is already in progress and will last till September 30, 2019.

If all goes according to plan, the mission, as per NASA, is scheduled to launch as early as July 2020, and the spacecraft is expected to touch down on the planet by February 2021.