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Three Raptor Engines Revealed on SpaceX Starship Hopper

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There previously was a wall covering the base of the SpaceX Starship Hopper. The wall has been removed to reveal three Raptor engines.

The Starhopper could be shorter than the final Starship. The Starship will need to be connected to a main booster section for the final Super Heavy Starship.

Starhopper tests will be performed at the SpaceX Texas facility. These tests should start in March or April.

It should be sent to orbit in 2020.

124 thoughts on “Three Raptor Engines Revealed on SpaceX Starship Hopper”

  3. That’s… exemplary bad policy. But again, are we in serious risk of a XXIth century repetition of that?

  4. Actually, the Chinese government didn’t just cut funding. That would have left private companies and traders that would probably have continued expansion, albeit at a slower pace.
    Instead they cited national security concerns and BANNED ocean travel, burned the fleets, burned the large shipyards and destroyed heaps of records.
    You could probably make a decent bit of modern distopian fiction by just using the recorded history and updating the clothing styles to 21st century USA.

  5. Chill out.

    Given the fuel won’t take itself to the landed rockets that means “some assembly required”, ergo people must be on the surface to do it.

    Besides the amount of fuel required won’t make it trivial to have it all produced with a single Sabatier reactor or without setting up some external storage (that is, building some pumps and pipes, i.e. more “some assembly required”).

  6. So many argument here saying this and that. Well, Musk definitely hired a correct engineer looking at Falcon 9 & FH exhibition last year.

  7. ” So someone has to land without knowing if they will return in 2,4 or 6 years or ever (they can die or be stranded, albeit it is doubtful they will be abandoned). ”

    Where did you ever get the monumentally stupid idea that they will land without knoweing the ISRL fuel is already made and stored to permit their return? I mean that very seriously, where did you get that idea?

  8. Yes, they do have to have the nerve and funding to do it in a way NASA would not approve of. But that IS their goal, colonization, not exploration.

    You can identify a number of places where SpaceX is inevitably going to come into conflict with NASA at some point. Manrating, not starting with just a manned flyby, embarrassing NASA by landing the first men on Mars privately.

    But the real conflict is going to arrive when NASA realizes that the colonization goal conflicts with the science goal, that SpaceX isn’t going to preserve Mars in a pristine form to maximize science yield.

  9. The purpose of this is to test the engines at the proper weight ratios for a sub-orbital hop. To see how well the engine design and tanks fair in a real world environment, to go up pretty high and then land. The facility to build the production version is still under construction in LA.

  10. One of SpaceX’s core principles is: Don’t use dedicated hardware, economize on engineering effort by using the same hardware for multiple jobs.

    A Mars orbital habitat just to teleoperate the work on the ground would violate that core principle. Once they’ve landed a habitat and supplies enough for one or two synodic periods, they will go straight to the ground with the people. Direct to ground from transfer orbit, instead of establishing Mars orbit first, economizes on delta V and thus increases payload.

    If that means the people on the ground can’t immediately turn around and leave, they have to wait a couple years before that’s even possible, so be it. This isn’t one of NASA’s touch and go missions, it’s colonization.

  11. This scene does not resemble any NASA launch preparation I can remember.
    It looks more like a scene from Star Trek, 1st Contact where James Cromwell launches from his backyard, engages the 1st warp drive which initiates 1st contact….
    I’m going to drive down there to see if I can catch a glimpse of Mr. Cromwell parading around in his long coonskin jacket….. 😉

  12. This thing is a Tin Can if you want to go to Mars you had better research “Applied Materials” Elon!!!! Applied Materials is what NASA Uses and you are not going to Mars in a welded Tin Can!

  13. Another good reason to go to Mars orbit first – tele-operate robots to set up the fuel production plant before landing…

  14. Would having the government pull its funding and refraining from doing any business with SpaceX kill it?

    A few years back, yes. Anything is easy to be killed in the crib.

    Today, probably not. They depend on government contracts for their revenue and growth, but they could live with other paying customers.

    It could delay the expensive treasure fleet voyages a while, though.

    But once Starlink is up and producing revenue, they will be self funded even for future ship development.

    They could end up not going to Mars at all, if nobody is willing to pony up some of the money, but that depends on how much Musk wants to go.

  16. “information, expensive souvenirs and intangibles (e.g. national pride, know how).”

    Sounds almost exactly like the results of the Chinese treasure fleet voyages of the 1420s. When domestic issues got tight the government pulled funding, shut the whole program down, and handed control of the world to Europe.

  21. I can think of a few “showstoppers” that need to be mitigated before sending humans to Mars surface. When reading about the Apollo landings, it becomes obvious how big a practical problem it is to find a safe landing spot. BFR is kind of heavy, even on Mars. Will the ground support it? How can that be determined before attempting touchdown? Avoiding rocks is one thing but finding firm ground can’t be done without close contact. Maybe some sort of precursor mission is needed. Orbital impactors? Maybe they should have sent some rods to Mars instead of that roadster.

    Another thing is bio contamination. NASA has gone to great lengths to disinfect everything they send to the surface not to spoil chances to discover life. Do we want to contaminate Mars before we know?

  22. Actually the first missions will probably involve a bunch of satellites being positioned around Mars fro communications, GPS and mapping and deploying communications relays in orbits around the sun between earth and Mars to allow for better communication when the planet is positioned further from earth. It would be very hard to hunt for resources without them and they don’t want to blindly land and search once they get there.

  24. So far the only resources they can bring back are information, expensive souvenirs and intangibles (e.g. national pride, know how). And the only potential buyers for Mars trips are NASA and other space agencies.

    Also these buyers aren’t willing to buy right now, given they are mostly not convinced about the whole scheme or they are busy making their own rockets, presumably for the same purpose.

    But this rocket will work for a lot more than just Mars trips, which are a pet project of Elon Musk.

    BFR/Starship reusable rockets look like a revolution, even if nobody picks the bait and wants to tag along in their trip to Mars (unlikely).

    But if there’s one thing I have learned, is that Musk is a believer and therefore SpaceX is going to Mars no matter what, as long as E. Musk lives and his companies remain profitable. Even if he has to put it from his pocket.

    SpaceX, Starlink, Boring Co. and others are really steps on the road towards this grand life-long vision.

  25. So we agree with RedHammer that it isn’t easy then? Not if you need a giant hydraulic press to do it.
    And think how big the press you need to make a BFS sized panel.

  26. Absolutely. The difference between the Norse expeditions across the Atlantic in the 10th-15th centuries, and the Chinese voyages of Cheng He on the one hand, and the Spanish/Portuguese led age of exploration on the other hand came down to one thing:
    The Iberians could come back from their multi-year voyage of exploration and mapping, with an 80% death toll from Scurvy, disease and accidents, and losing 70% of the ships they started with, and they would open the hold of the remaining ship and pull out enough gold, silver, cloves, pepper, silk, cinnamon, saffron and ultramarine to pay for the entire voyage, make all the survivors rich, and inspire a dozen new such voyages to be organised.

  27. I have a feeling people aren’t understanding that this is just a thing to test the raptors and software basically.

  28. Indeed. Mars is just the tip of the iceberg. LEO, MEO and GEO is where the bucks are.

    Cheap enough reusable rockets with a fast relaunch rate will make a lot of science fictional scenarios possible.

    Like keeping something as the Starlink alive and working. Or things like private space stations and hotels, facilities for sale and lease, either for industry and human habitation. Or things like solar power satellites and private probes and rovers, or mining drones.

    All of them are waiting for cheap enough rockets and space logistics.

  29. Not with a local branch caching the hottest content on Earth, made possible using a high bandwidth interplanetary Starlink.

  31. That can only work if SpaceX has the gall and the coin to do it alone.

    Which won’t be beyond the realm of possibility if their Starlink plans pan out and they suddenly have greater-than-NASA’s budget, but let’s be real: they want government on their side and cooperating, lest things go south as it sometimes happens in space.

    A failure with casualties on a purely private first manned mission would be catastrophic for SpaceX and its Mars colonization plans.

  33. I suspect the biggest deployment issue would be mining water for hydrogen. But per Mars Direct, the cargo ship could take along hydrogen, in which case an on-board fuel factory just needs to deploy an air intake.

  34. No BFS/Starship can return from the Martian surface until there is fuel production and refueling in place.

    The cargo ships on the surface are stranded until someone goes to setup the fuel production, refuels and recovers them.

  35. In another post I argue for a Mars injection, rendezvous and return mission, without orbiting, as a preliminary stage towards sending a crew to the surface.

    I think this kind of mission can be unmanned, but it could also be manned if they feel confident about the architecture.

    It would be similar to having astronauts in the ISS for several months in terms of stress and requirements, with the difference of not having supplies and assistance a few hours away. And the risk of solar storms and cosmic rays.

    Orbiting Mars is harder to do, given it would require some extra fuel for braking and leaving. Less than for a surface launch for sure, but still enough to make it cumbersome to have at hand in Mars’ orbit.

    Probably one of the preliminary cargo missions could be a fuel depot?

    In any case, for me it seems harder than a rendezvous and with less motivation to do it than a complete manned landing.

  36. “So someone has to land without knowing if they will return in 2,4 or 6 years or ever (they can die or be stranded, albeit it is doubtful they will be abandoned).”

    It’s a colonization mission, not a scientific mission. In theory they aren’t ever supposed to return.

  37. First mission to Mars may have the equipment to begin production of fuel for the return trip, but they have stated (at least the last that I’ve heard) that they will not have an automatic deployment of the factory. That will have to be done by the first colonists. Automatically deploying a system of that complexity is beyond our current technology.

  38. There won’t be any re-entry heating on this test article. It’s for lower atmosphere (up to 3 miles) tests only. Think: giant “hopper”.

  39. I would be surprised if the FAA would approve a human mission to Mars surface without a lot more assurance (via more testing) of keeping the crew alive than SpaceX might tolerate. Going to Mars orbit first eases that concern considerably.

    And I’ll be surprised if NASA doesn’t use its influence to make sure that the first crew to Mars is from NASA – too big a PR event to miss (think in terms of assuring future budgets). And of course they’ll want to make sure the mission is safe by their standards, lest the PR turn very bad. Yes of course NASA would care about the crew itself – but the easiest way to protect a crew is to not send them. Heck, NASA has proposed just flying PAST Mars as a first human mission!

  40. SpaceX Mars plans focus almost entirely on how to get to the surface and return. That should be reconsidered in light of costs, timing and risk/reward.

    SpaceX’s Mars plan as of August 2018 requires 4 Starships – 2 crew and 2 cargo ships. That assumes 2 earlier cargo landers return to Earth and get reused. That’s a lot of ships to get built by 2024 and then tie up at Mars while continuing near Earth operations.

    An orbit-only mission could use 2 ships – first a 1 or 2 ship cargo mission, followed 2 years later by a crew ship and cargo ship. The cargo ships could land at 2 or 3 different exploration sites instead of focusing on making a single site as survivable as possible for a human crew. The crew ship could land on Deimos for radiation shelter and to explore. Or maybe Phobos – more delta-V, but closer to Mars.

  41. Nobody has spent more than a few days at gravity between 0 & 1 g. Until we have people & other animals living at lunar or martian gravity for months we won’t know if there are any problems like the macular degeneration you mention.

  42. I agree that building and enabling the refueling of rockets on Mars requires people on the surface.

    The cargo rockets will be pretty monuments until someone actually lands and uses their cargo.

    And the return mission (launching from Mars and going all the way to land on Earth) can only happen once ISRU refueling is working.

    So someone has to land without knowing if they will return in 2,4 or 6 years or ever (they can die or be stranded, albeit it is doubtful they will be abandoned).

    Those are big unknowns that need people simply taking the risk and doing them.

    My main point is that the rocket and systems survival over the long periods they are supposed to pass in space is not known, and that it would be irresponsible to launch people without knowing if their rockets can survive a much simpler and less demanding rendezvous mission first.

  43. I should hope the don’t need to Glock there. But you know, it is better to have one and not need it than to need one and not have it.

  45. If I understand correctly, the first mission to Mars is intended to be a couple of BFRs carrying the equipment to manufacture fuel on site, and maybe some other cargo usable for colonists.

    (Arguably the first mission should be a really good rover and satellite combo, to identify the best landing site, but maybe Musk thinks they can do that based on the info NASA’s efforts have obtained.)

    By the next synodic period, they would have refueled themselves from Martian resources, as a new pair of BFR’s arrive, possibly manned, but likely with more cargo.

    At that point, the first set of rockets can return to Earth, confirming return capacity. Earth reentry at Mars return velocity can be tested earlier than that using a translunar flight.

    At that point, with a survivable base and supplies in place for at least a couple synodic periods, you could start manned flights to Mars.

    Launching the colonists *can* precede confirming Earth return capacity, so long as the habitat and at least one synodic period worth of supplies is in place, since they are colonists, and not really planning on returning.

  48. ‘NASA time’ is ’20 or 30 years from now’ – for 50 years. Elon time is generally a ‘a couple years earlier than reality’.

  49. Makes me wonder if New Glenn could be modded with a  Starship-like upper. New Glenn WILL be pretty larger. Then there is New Armstrong…

  51. As far as I know, this is not just for show. It’s a near-real size testing vehicle of the thrusters and control systems and it’s gonna fly.

    If it looks a bit informal is because it’s not a production vehicle. Those will be made in a proper factory under much more clean and controlled conditions. And specially, without any unwanted cameras.

  52. An Apollo 8-like Mars rendezvous mission would be interesting as test of the long term operation of the rocket in space, and for re-entry at interplanetary speeds.

    We have never done a mission of that size that returns to Earth and lands.

    And the good part is that it can be unmanned.

    Many don’t want to “waste” another Mars synod doing another preparation mission, but in this case, with so many unknowns and new things being performed at once, that kind of test seems unavoidable.

  53. Once the tanks are pressurized, it might push all of that bucked metal taught, and make it look a lot smoother.

  54. Cargo missions need no certification for sending stuff to Mars. They can test the architecture over this kind of long mission, but the Mars cargo launches themselves will only happen until several BFRs have been launched to orbit and landed safely.

    The human spaceflight certification is only required by NASA to send NASA’s astronauts. Given they are one of the main potential customers, it is important for SpaceX to have it.

    But they can proceed without it, and I think that the #DearMoon mission will happen without any such certification, just the FAA permissions and a validated rocket version that has already done the full mission without any crew.

    The rocket itself can be new, but the design’s behavior has to be a known factor by then. They certainly don’t want to be launching people in a test mission.

  55. If you can deliver people to Mars, you can also deliver people to the Moon, Near Earth Asteroids, and the main Asteroid Belt. It opens up the whole inner Solar System to development.

    The big bucks will come from space industry of various kinds, but we haven’t had cheap enough rockets or space mining and energy production yet. This solves the cheap enough rocket part, and Mars makes it exciting.

    Don’t over-focus on Mars. That’s just the shiny advertising brochure that gets good people to go to work for SpaceX. We certainly *will* develop Mars, because it has useful resources, but it is likely to be 5% of total space activity. Much more of it will be in Earth orbit, because Earth is where all the customers live.

  57. In the aerospace industry we call this an “iron bird”. It is not meant to fly like the final airplane. Rather, it is intended to test out the interaction of the plumbing, wiring, engines, control surfaces, and software at full scale, with all the lengths and flow conditions correct. The structure holding it all together needs to be the right size, but not the final materials or method of assembly.

    Since rocket engines depend on tank pressure to feed the turbopumps, this vehicle needs actual tanks of the right size, which can hold the right pressure, but it doesn’t matter what they are made of or how they are put together. You’re not going to orbit with this, or even as far as a drone ship.

  58. I believe that it’s merely an assembly pad.

    The real one should have hold down clanks and a flame trench.

    That being said, you can make a decent PyroCrete with plaster of Paris and playground sand.

  59. BO has tested, flown, and reflown reusable Methalox engines.

    Also:

    • Methalox: Methane-Oxygen engines (in contrast to say Hydrolox, Kerolox)
    • MOX: Mixed oxide nuclear fuel (containing Uranium and Plutonium)

    Now if SpaceX was testing and flying a MOX engine then well we would be living in interesting times.

  60. What will those plates look like when they’ve expanded due to re-entry heating is what you should be asking.

  61. Its just a hopper. Doesn’t have to withstand high velocity exit or re-entry into earths thick atmosphere.

  63. Don’t worry about it. You’re just not used to seeing flight articles at this stage of manufacture.

    You should see what carbon fiber airplanes look like before they put a coat of paint on them.

  64. Never mind the cosmetics of the exterior. The purpose of the tests is obviously to verify the propulsion and control systems. One thing to note is that the curvature of the engine bells changes about 1/5 down from the top. I’ve seen some rumors that this might be an attempt to optimize for both lower atmosphere and vacuum performance. The exhaust would detach from the lower bell close to sea level and expand to the full bell in low pressure/vacuum. It will be very interesting to see if this is correct.

  66. The plan IS to put off a human landing on Mars until there’s cargo and habitat pre-positioned.

    OTOH, I don’t see the humans in high orbit contributing all that much; The current plan is to directly land on Mars without establishing orbit first, so the need for orbital assets is pretty limited. Prospecting for water ice on Deimos would only make sense if he was planning for the ships to achieve Mars orbit prior to entry or Earth insertion.

    I’m not sure that the extra expense for an orbital habitat just to enable teleoperation is worth it. Mars surface colonists can teleoperate just as well.

  67. Agree, get in Koeneg container out in the desert, after 1 month, the nolvety will wear off and you will be begging to come home.Its just a version of solitary confinement.

  68. Right, not an actual space craft… This is to prove out technologies, software and etc. This will most likely never experience re-entry temperatures and stresses… To me it seems like “unit” test to prove out software control systems and tweaked engines and etc… Ugly if fine for this.

  69. Exactly

    You can’t exactly figure out what works without being able to land the damn thing in one piece.

    New footprint
    New engine tech
    New aerodynamics

    You gotta relearn all that stuff.

    Just because you know how to land a pencil on its eraser doesn’t mean you can land a bullet.

  70. This is REAL tech, not your Star Trek fantasy.
    This particular prototype won’t even leave the atmosphere, that’s not its purpose.
    Fiirst you gotta walk before you can run.
    This is the walking portion of their iterative design process.

  71. That’s if they’re on ‘NASA time’
    ‘Elon time’ is different.
    With a SpaceX crew,
    Commercial level contractors,
    and all the management infrastructure,
    probably ~ a year after tech freeze.
    So 2024 might be aspirational,
    but I think it’s pretty accurate.

  72. This is being built economically and I like that, but also it’s in the public view and is free hype so I hope they shine it up a bit so people can admire it. There is value to flare

  73. So we get to the see real “stars” of the event. Even if this particular Starship design does not work out the Raptor engines represent a great advance. I believe this will be the first test flight of a reusable MOX based engine. My main question is if they can bolt this down and fire it up a few times before releasing it into the sky … I don’t know of this low cost concrete pad will allow for it.

  76. This seems to be a “building” and not a “spacecraft” of any kind. I am getting the impression that they are actually building the actual prototype somewhere else.

  77. Any of you guys ever hear the word boilerplate. What they are building is not a rocket ship but a test bed for the engines.

  79. That’s not meant to go to space. It’s the short hop test vehicle and the construction is adequate for that purpose. Anything fancier would be just waste.

  84. This is probably a functional scale vehicle solely intended for atmospheric testing for the vertical takeoff and landing system. The final product will most likely look like the computer image renderings.

  86. Since when do they build rocket ship outside? Always in super clean environment. Thing looks like cheap prop

  87. This is just sad. When the space enthusiasts can’t figure out the difference between a show & tell mock-up assembly and the real thing, my hope for Humanity is sorely tested.

  88. Definitely not a Star Trek Federation design. Looks cheap and junky to me. No way it can do warp five. The impulse engines look old school to me. I’ll pass on that thing.

  89. Thats all true, but esthatics are not important here. All they need is a structure thats aligned with the next iteration. This build is for control hop tests, far from the actual design.

  91. No, we already know that is not a possibility. Not even vaguely. If that were true, it would have showed up in astronauts long before now, and it has not.

    Your better screen name would be “sour grapes”.

  92. No, it just shows you have no idea what the actual goals are.

    ” It’s a mixture of poor planning, and ambitious timelines. Like how Tesla had to build a giant tent to increase model 3 production. ” <– So if something doesn;t work, it is a failure of some sort to be practical and flexible about it?

    You are daft, punk. The helmet is not supposed to cut of your oxygen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daft_Punk

    We should hope for more such “poor planning”.

  93. Seriously the nose metal plates looks all kinked ! Lightyears away from the design version. I m really wondering what I m looking at. Plus don’t they build big planes totally indoor !? I ve trouble to belive this is the real thing.

  94. Also new engines burning methane and an totally new reaction control system using methane and oxygen gas trusters. they will also use this gas to pressurized the tanks.
    None of this has even been used in flight before.

    Add that the BFS is less aerodynamic stable on landing than the F9 first stage with its grind fins and the inter-stage opening.
    The BFS is bullet shaped and would probably not land bottom first unless controlled.

    So to me it makes sense to test the landing part first then test high speed operations.

  95. Im still not sure what exactly they expect to learn from it though. AFAICS, they pretty much mastered reentry and suicide burn landings. The challenges with BFR will be aerodynamic stresses from their unusual reentry and heat. To test that, you have to go in orbit, or at least go really fast. Is this contraption supposed to survive that? It doesnt look like it, but what do i know.

  99. If the craft looks less than anyones expectations.. this is just a “hopping” craft!
    It is a disposable craft prototype built with the intention to learn how to construct, fly, and operate a craft this large.
    Even if it blows up, falls over, or is successful entirely, there is little merit in making it straight as an arrow. This is a near enough/good enough approach, likely as they are a business with an aim to learn and move on.

  100. Wouldn’t it need a fairly good reserve of delta-v for burn back and landing? Since all portions of the new craft are propulsively landed, the BFR booster would need sufficient remainder delta-v to boost back and landing, and BFS would need sufficient remaining delta-v to perform all on-orbit manuvers and propulsively land.

  103. Install swimming pools, solar panels, tennis courts and wifi for big screen tV. And, oh yes, a service station to refuel and change the oil. And for sightseeing.

  104. I’m sorry to say this, but the quality of the stainless steel fastened to the internal structure is rough. Hopefully, this is not how future ships will be manufactured. It looks bad, irregular, with deviations across the whole skin. Even atmospheric aircraft and automobiles have better looking surfaces, which are hydroformed into close tolerance surfaces and structures. Maybe future workmanship and engineering can obtain a more cosmetic appearance.

  105. I worked out BFR’s broad characteristics as presented so far. It appears Starship will have an ace up its sleave, a huge amount of reserve Delta V. Else it would orbit much more than 100 metric tons.

  106. Until Elon can resolve the macular degeneration problem of long duration exposure to low g and low mB for Mars travel, let alone living there, everyone coming and going to Mars will come back blind.

  107. We might see a cargo-only attempt in 2022. But human rating the system for long term missions could take some time – e.g. long missions close to Earth. A first human Mars mission might happen in 2026, with strong chance of a 2 year delay. NASA approval (especially if supplying the crew, which may be a condition for approval) could easily add that much delay.

    Even then, disappointing as it sounds, we should probably hold off attempting to land humans on Mars until after a number of successful un-crewed cargo landings and pre-positioning a spare human-rated ship on the surface. First put humans into a high Mars orbit and control robots scattered around the planet’s surface to explore, prospect, identify the best location for a human base and begin setting it up. Explore Deimos – prospect for buried water ice.

  108. He just wants to test the use of multiple engines simultaneously used in a hop. Control and thrust levels.

  109. Agreed. But he’s known he’s going to be building this for over 2 years now. It’s a mixture of poor planning, and ambitious timelines. Like how Tesla had to build a giant tent to increase model 3 production.

  110. exploration, discoveries, being “the first” to do something on a new world, adventures. Some people do go to the artic, just for kicks, or explore caves, or dive in the deepest caves.
    I would like to visit Mars…once it’s “established”, meaning in ~30 years.

  111. Why a permanent settlement on Mars? People won’t Glock there unless there’s some kind of reason to do it. The permanent settlement won’t happen. Just like we don’t have people moving to Antarctica just for kicks. There’s no reason to do it. So what reason is there live on Mars?

  113. Right, because a building costs 20 billion a year. The building could be built in a year, for 50 million minimum. Remember, it’s a pretty hollow building.

  114. First MARS crew mission….don’t forget about the Japanese billionaire in 2023 going around the moon. But I guarantee some other people will go to space on it, before the “Dear Moon” mission.

  115. May be from welding distortion, thin stainless warps pretty easy when welded with a process that involves heat.

  117. Musk concentrates on the essentials. So far, his schedule on the BFR/Starship isn’t slipping at all — SpaceX have learned a lot from experience. We’re on track for the hop tests this year, and beginning earlier than originally thought.

    At this rate, it’s first orbital launch of the Starship/Super Heavy in 2020, first unmanned Mars mission in 2022, first crewed mission in 2024, and the permanent settlement in 2028.

    All praise Elon! He’s giving us back the future as it -should- be.

  119. If you’re willing to fund them with ~20billion a year, i’m sure they would be willing to build a shiny Vehicle Assembly building just like NASAs

  121. Lots of cool pics, But I’m surprised they aren’t building this indoors.
    Not just for the privacy, but a controlled environment is always faster for building things. Of course it would have to be a big building…but that’s not impossible to build, just look at NASA’s Vehicle Assembly building.

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