SPACEX is preparing to get Starship – the most powerful rocket ever built – into orbit today during its third test launch.
The 400ft tall mega-rocket is the spacecraft intended to get boots on the moon in 2026, and will eventual become the ferry that takes humans to Mars.
Musk thinks Starship’s third attempt has a good shot at success[/caption]
Should the rocket reach orbit and achieve a stable reentry, the US will be pushed firmly ahead of China in the race for the moon[/caption]
Elon Musk‘s space company is targeting 14 March 12pm GMT/ 8am ET for take-off.
It comes four months after Starship’s second attempt at reaching orbit, which exploded roughly 10 minutes after launch.
The third flight will see SpaceX attempt procedures it hasn’t yet tested, including a propellant transfer demonstration during the upper stage’s coast phase, the first ever re-light of a Raptor engine while in space, and a controlled reentry into Earth’s atmosphere.
Achieving a propellant – or fuel – transfer while up in the air will be essential to landing humans on the moon and for having enough gas to reach Mars.
In a statement on Starship mission website, SpaceX writes that it will also “fly a new trajectory, with Starship targeted to splashdown in the Indian Ocean.
“This new flight path enables us to attempt new techniques like in-space engine burns while maximising public safety.”
These tasks make this Starship’s most ambitious flight yet.
And Musk thinks Starship’s third attempt has a good shot at success.
US vs China
Should the rocket reach orbit and achieve a stable reentry, the US will be pushed firmly ahead of China in the race for the moon.
China is still yet to test its rival moon rocket Long March 10, which it will attempt to fly for the first time sometime between 2025 and 2026.
The US and China are competing to get to the moon’s south pole first, which both countries believe is the most viable location for a permanent lunar base.
Nasa administrator Bill Nelson fears Beijing’s military presence in the South China Sea suggests how the country might behave on the lunar surface, which would breach the 1967 Outer Space Treaty.
Nelson’s concerns were voiced before China unveiled plans to build a Disneyland-sized lunar base and a lunar nuclear reactor with Russia.
Life on Mars
Starship is the embodiment of Musk’s personal mission to make humans an interplanetary species.
The 33-engine, $3billion mega-rocket is designed to transport up to 100 people from Earth to the moon and eventually Mars in the 2030s.
From the onset, Starship was designed with the capacity to store more than 100tons of cargo.
This is so it can store everything needed to build permanent bases on both alien worlds.
Not only is it the tallest rocket to ever be flown, the first stage of Starship, known as the Super Heavy booster, is the most powerful rocket ever built and can produce up to 7.6million kilograms of thrust.
That is nearly double the current record held by Nasa’s Space Launch System (SLS).
Starship, developed as part of a $1.15billion contract with Nasa, refers to the reusable stainless steel top half of the rocket.
Whereas as the bottom half of the rocket is its booster, known as Super Heavy.
Not only will the rocket be critical in future Mars missions, but it has also been selected to launch a new outpost that is intended to replaced the ageing International Space Station.
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