Nasa wants to send humans to Venus - now that's brilliant idea; here's why

The idea behind NASA's new mission is not to land people on the inhospitable surface, but to use the dense atmosphere as a base for exploration

Popular science fiction of the early 20th century depicted Venus as some kind of wonderland of pleasantly warm temperatures, forests, swamps and even dinosaurs. In 1950, the Hayden Planetarium at the American Natural History Museum were soliciting reservations for the first space tourism mission, well before the modern era of Blue Origins, SpaceX and Virgin Galactic. All you had to do was supply your address and tick the box for your preferred destination, which included Venus.

Today, Venus is unlikely to