Mars

In the solar system, now there is no place more romantic than the planet Mars, on the surface of which more apparatuses visited than in the Mariana Trench. However, our attitude towards him has already begun to change: too many technical details come from space probes, the professional interests of those who tell us today about Mars are too narrow.
There were moments when the whole enlightened world only spoke of Mars. In 1898 was written "War of the Worlds" by G. Wells - a novel about the invasion of the Martians on Earth. The English writer created his masterpiece under the influence of the latest astronomical discoveries at the time. The charm of Mars for a long time left no great writers: A.Tolstoy's Aelita (1923), R. Bradbury's Martian Chronicles (1950), A.Azimov's Way of Martians (1955). In those years, every convergence of Mars with the Earth, called in astronomy by confrontation, caused a new surge of interest in the Red Planet.
The beginning of the space age opened the era of a heroic breakthrough to Mars (1960-1976), when the USSR and the US fought for the right of the first approach, the first
landing and other "first places" on the pedestal of astronautics. Since the mid-1990s, the systematic study of this still mysterious planet began, more
others on the surface conditions reminding the Earth and disappointing the lack of long-awaited Martians.
Today we are seeing a new interest in the planet Mars. In September 2017, at the International Congress of Astronautics in Australia, Ilon Mask presented a project of a missile system that could deliver people to Mars. In Florida, the first launch of a heavy launch vehicle Falcon Heavy, which will go to the orbit of Mars. It will be able to be in deep space for billions of years, approaching either the Earth or Mars.
Of course, today Mars is not so attracted to science fiction, but for scientists right now it is becoming an advanced frontier of practical work. Mars is more studied than the bottom of the World Ocean or the surface of the Moon close to us. And the more detailed we become acquainted with Mars, the more attractive it becomes for various specialists. Therefore, it's time to remember how it all began, what breakthroughs and misconceptions were along the way, what this relatively small planet looks like, whose areography we will soon have to learn as thoroughly as the geography of the Earth.

image taken from the site betterday