Elon Musk is still waiting for Starship, Elon Musk has staked his firm on a massive rocket, but he has yet to provide answers to some key questions.
Musk provided his first official update on SpaceX’s Starship project since 2019, stating that the vehicle would reach orbit in six months.
We’re still waiting for that moment, more than two years later. Musk stated today that he is “very optimistic” that the rocket will reach space this year. He didn’t respond to queries about what his engineers still need to do before the flight test, or how he plans to prove the vehicle is spaceworthy enough for NASA astronauts.
The stakes are high: Musk informed SpaceX staff in November 2021 that the firm would go bankrupt unless it could fly Starship once every two weeks in 2022. He later clarified that this was in the worst-case situation of the firm being unable to secure financing, but the vehicle’s importance to SpaceX is undeniable.
There has been progress: the vehicle has hopped to higher altitudes and attempted to land, frequently with disastrous outcomes. The most recent test, which took place in May 2021, saw the vehicle reach a height of 10 kilometres before safely landing. And, tonight, the business unveiled a new, more efficient version of the engines that would propel Starship into space—assuming the company can construct enough of them that don’t melt down.
In 2022, what will Starship do?
The only question now is when the spacecraft will try its first orbital voyage. To do so, Starship will have to employ the Super Heavy, a new rocket booster that will propel it out of Earth’s gravity well. SpaceX proposed an initial flight in which the Super Heavy booster hurls the Starship into orbit before landing in the Gulf of Mexico, while the Starship itself orbits the Earth before using its rockets to lower itself to a soft landing in the ocean near the Hawaiian Islands, according to a test plan filed with the Federal Aviation Administration.