At the same time, several companies are striving to reach the fourth planet from the Sun: SpaceX, NASA and Roskosmos.

The commercial spaceflight company SpaceX announced on Twitter today that it plans to send its robotic Dragon capsule to Mars as early as 2018. "Red Dragons will inform the overall Mars architecture," SpaceX claimed, referring to the company's eventual plans to set up a colony on Mars — a key goal of SpaceX and its founder, billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk. Note that spacecraft has more than once reached the surface of Mars, but none of private companies has not participated in such flights yet.

Photo: SpaceX spacecraft.

Ilon Mask states that the SpaceX rocket will go to Mars in May 2018 - exactly then the distance between the Earth and the Red Planet will be optimal. If the launch of the device for some reason does not take place, the next attempt will be possible only in 2020.

NASA has set a new launch opportunity, beginning May 5, 2018, for the InSight mission to Mars. InSight's primary goal is to help us understand how rocky planets – including Earth – formed and evolved. The spacecraft had been on track to launch this month until a vacuum leak in its prime science instrument prompted NASA in December to suspend preparations for launch. “The science goals of InSight are compelling, and the NASA and CNES plans to overcome the technical challenges are sound," said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. "The quest to understand the interior of Mars has been a longstanding goal of planetary scientists for decades. We're excited to be back on the path for a launch, now in 2018.”

NASA is planning another event for 2020 - the launch of the latest-generation Mars rover. Robots created to study Mars, have been flying to the Red Planet since 1993 as a part of its development program.

Right now, NASA is constructing a monster rocket, called the Space Launch System, that will be the most powerful rocket ever built. This rocket is designed for NASA's future deep-space missions to an asteroid, the Moon, Mars, and beyond.

Taller than the Statue of Liberty and capable of carrying more than twice the payload weight of any of NASA'S former space shuttles, the Space Launch System will transport six astronauts at a time on board the agency's Orion spacecraft farther into space than any human has ever ventured before. The first unmanned test flight of this rocket is scheduled for September 2018.it is also going to visit Mars by the 2030s.

ESA and the Russian federal space agency, Roscosmos, have signed a formal agreement to work in partnership on the ExoMars programme towards the launch of two missions in 2016 and 2019. Establishing whether life ever existed on Mars is one of the outstanding scientific questions of our time and the highest scientific priority of the ExoMars programme. The partners have agreed a balanced sharing of responsibilities for the different mission elements. ESA will provide the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) and the Entry, Descent and Landing Demonstrator Module (EDM) in 2016, and the carrier and rover in 2019.

Other countries are also interested in studying Mars. For example, India has already managed to send to the planet the Mangalian spacecraft. In 2018 or 2020, this state intends to launch the second spacecraft – Mangalyan-2.

The “Hope” Mars mission under development by the United Arab Emirates has continued to make progress in recent weeks with the announcement that NASA will be collaborating with the UAE Space Agency.

China is also getting ready to participate in its first interplanetaryenterprise, teaming up with Russia, in a daring attempt to retrieve samples from the Martian moon Phobos.