Elon Musk unveils his plans for Starship

Elon Musk has given space fans an outline of plans for “Starship”, the next-generation vehicle SpaceX expects to use to eventually take humans to Mars.

The goal is to make “space travel like air travel”, Musk said on stage on Saturday during a highly technical presentation from the company’s Boca Chica test site near Brownsville, Texas. “We’re really right on the cusp of what’s physically possible.”

Ultimately, Starship will carry as many as 100 people on long-duration, interplanetary flights pic.twitter.com/mDujtYeLwV

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 29, 2019

Closely held SpaceX currently flies its workhorse Falcon 9 and more powerful Falcon Heavy rockets for customers that include Nasa, commercial satellite operators and the US military. Nasa has contracted with Boeing and SpaceX to ferry American astronauts to the International Space Station through what’s known as the Commercial Crew Programme, but the timeline for the programme has repeatedly slipped, and it appears unlikely that either company will fly the first astronauts this year.

During a question and answer session with space journalists, Musk responded to Nasa administrator Jim Bridenstine’s Friday tweet that said “Commercial Crew is years behind schedule”. Bridenstine also said the agency expects the same level of enthusiasm seen for SpaceX as on “the investments of the American taxpayer”.

“From a SpaceX resource standpoint, our resources are overwhelmingly on Falcon and Dragon,” Musk said. “Let’s be clear, it was really quite a small percentage of SpaceX that did Starship.”

Starship will be the most powerful rocket in history, capable of carrying humans to the Moon, Mars, and beyond pic.twitter.com/LloN8AQdei

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 29, 2019

SpaceX is valued at US$34-billion, according to an analysis by EquityZen, a marketplace for shares in pre-IPO technology companies. Musk founded the Hawthorne, California-based company in 2002. Though he is more widely know for being the CEO of electric car maker Tesla, space travel has long been his passion.

SpaceX is building Starship vehicles in both Boca Chica and Cape Canaveral, Florida. Musk said that SpaceX teams are competing internally, and the first crewed mission could leave from Boca Chica. SpaceX is hoping to acquire residential properties in the hamlet of Boca Chica Village and has sent buyout offers to households.  — Reported by Dana Hull, (c) 2019 Bloomberg LP