Would it be possible with current rocketry to go from Earth to Mercury and then come back?

Leaving aside the matter of how well would humans fare on the surface of Mercury (we only have to factor in the weight of their life support: air, water, food and spacesuits), and assuming materials and methods available today, would it be possible to come back from Mercury once you landed? You'd have to either carry the fuel to thrust away from Mercury and the Sun or to produce it locally (if it's possible to produce the fuel locally, we can assume any number of previous one-way missions taking the necessary machinery to Mercury, and the crew of the return mission would only have to assemble and operate such machinery).

The B-side of the question: how much would it all cost, very roughly speaking?

Finally, if there's no way of making it, is there any current research being conducted on something that would hint at promising the possibility of such a trip? What research would that be?

posted about 4 years ago

Davi‭

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