SpaceX @Starlink has over 5 million customers, up from 4.6 million in December 2024 and 3 million in May 2024.
Starship Flight 8 goals:
– Deploy four Starlink simulators
– Super Heavy Booster launch, return, and catch
– Conduct critical reentry tests, including stress-testing with fewer tiles and evaluating new thermal protection options pic.twitter.com/em0Jj9DPPj
— Dima Zeniuk (@DimaZeniuk) February 24, 2025
Starship Flight 8 goals:
– Deploy four Starlink version 3 simulators (dummy satellites)
– Super Heavy Booster launch, return, and catch
– Conduct critical reentry tests, including stress-testing with fewer tiles and evaluating new thermal protection options
Starship will start launching V3 Starlink satellites, which will add 60 Tbps of capacity to the network per launch – more than 20x per Falcon 9 launch today. Operational version 3 Starlink satellites will likely start launching in April, 2025.
There is a good chance of achieving full reusability of Starship this year.
Full and immediate reflight of Starship, along with orbital refilling, probably happens next year.
This is the fundamental breakthrough needed to make life multiplanetary.
There is a good chance of achieving full reusability of Starship this year.
Full and immediate reflight of Starship, along with orbital refilling, probably happens next year.
This is the fundamental breakthrough needed to make life multiplanetary. https://t.co/HVtCd9EHKk
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 28, 2025
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
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On the recent JRE pod Musk seemed to be concerned over the tile issues.
Did not talk about manned mission flights soon with any kind of confidence.
One can see the change in Musks attitude when Joe asks uninformed questions about SpaceX operations.
You’d think Joe would have a basic understanding, after years of Musk interviews and off-air association.
Shows how closed up in a bubble he is.
I would like him to have asked, “What concrete steps are being taken by SpaceX to design the systems required for a trip to Mars?” beyond the ship itself.
To my knowledge, there is no program specific to the mission.