SpaceX's Big Starship Reveal Raised More Questions Than Answers – Forbes, Forbes.com

In a small town in Texas over the weekend, Musk unveiled SpaceX’s latest mammoth project, Starship, which the company hopes will one day transport up to 100 people per flight to Mars – and even beyond. But while many have lauded the breathtaking visuals and ambition, key questions still remain considering SpaceX’s aggressive upcoming schedule.

Starship is, without a doubt, one of the most exciting things to happen in human spaceflight in recent decades. Measuring 50 meters tall and made of stainless steel – giving SpaceX a hugecost-savingover more traditional carbon fiber – the vehicle has a mammoth lifting capability of more than 100 tons, greater than any vehicle in history.

It will launch atop a large booster called Super Heavy, itself measuring 68 meters tall. Both vehicles are designed to be reusable, landing back on Earth and ready to fly again at a moment’s notice. Super Heavy will be powered by 37 of the company’sRaptor engines, Starship by six of them.

” this is the most inspiring thing i’ve ever seen,” musk said at company’s event in boca chica on saturday, september 28, where starship was unveiled to a thrilled audience.>

In a small town in Texas over the weekend, Musk unveiled SpaceX’s latest mammoth project, Starship, which the company hopes will one day transport up to 100 people per flight to Mars – and even beyond. But while many have lauded the breathtaking visuals and ambition, key questions still remain considering SpaceX’s aggressive upcoming schedule.

Starship is, without a doubt, one of the most exciting things to happen in human spaceflight in recent decades. Measuring 50 meters tall and made of stainless steel – giving SpaceX a hugecost-savingover more traditional carbon fiber – the vehicle has a mammoth lifting capability of more than 100 tons, greater than any vehicle in history.

It will launch atop a large booster called Super Heavy, itself measuring 68 meters tall. Both vehicles are designed to be reusable, landing back on Earth and ready to fly again at a moment’s notice. Super Heavy will be powered by 37 of the company’sRaptor engines, Starship by six of them.

“This is the most inspiring thing I’ve ever seen,” Musk said at the company’s event in Boca Chica on Saturday, September 28, where Starship was unveiled to a thrilled audience. “It’s really going to be pretty epic to see that thing take off and come back.”

The plan at the moment is for this prototype version of the final vehicle, known as Mark 1, to launch to an altitude of 20 kilometers in the next month or two. Within six months, if the company sticks to its “exponential” development schedule, Musk says the Mark 3 version could reach orbit in six months in early 2020. And human launches could even followthe same year, he says.

If that sounds ambitious, it is. SpaceX has yet to launch any humans at all, despite being contracted by NASA to do so on the considerably smaller and (perhaps unfairly) less impressive Crew Dragon vehicle. NASA chief Jim Bridenstinemade his feelings knownabout delays to that vehicle, funded by NASA’s Commercial Crew program, on Twitter last week.

“I am looking forward to the SpaceX announcement tomorrow,” Bridenstine said on Friday, September 27. “In the meantime, Commercial Crew is years behind schedule. NASA expects to see the same level of enthusiasm focused on the investments of the American taxpayer. It’s time to deliver.”

SpaceX launching humans next year on Starship seems almost unthinkable, although the company has proved many doubters wrong before. But numerous key questions remain about the Starship vehicle, questions that Musk has dodged or failed to provide adequate responses too.

One of those is the issue of safety. With regards to life support systems onboard the vehicle Musk waved off concerns, saying that these would be “not super hard” to develop compared to the actual construction of the vehicle. Others, however, have noted this is adangerous approach to taketo what is an exceedingly risky business.

Another is what will actually be inside the vehicle itself. While this Mark 1 vehicle is only an early prototype, customers such asYusaku Maezawa, the Japanese billionaire who has bought a ticket on a Starship flight around the Moon, might be wondering what they will actually be sitting on riding in if or when Starship eventually launches.

There is an uncomfortable question about launch abort too, something the Space Shuttle lacked to the detriment of seven astronauts on the Challenger disaster in 1986. In its current iteration Starship appears to have no launch abort system in the event of an accident on the pad or during launch to orbit. Only last year, such a systemsaved the livesof two astronauts aboard a Soyuz spacecraft. One presumes SpaceX might never recover from a disaster with humans on board.

And there are the much broader questions surrounding SpaceX’s goals of sending humans to other worlds. How will these people live? What will the cost be? What will happen if SpaceX went bankrupt? These, presumably, are things that will be addressed in the future, but it does not seem unreasonable to look for answers now.

SpaceX should, of course, be commended for the incredible progress they have made, not just with Starship – which only began construction earlier this year – but its Falcon and Dragon fleet of vehicles. However, it’s important to look beyond the hype and ask some critical questions about what is the most ambitious human spaceflight project in history.

“I do think things are going to move very fast,” Musk said at the event in Boca Chica. And one would hope many of the concerns about Starship, no matter how easy they might apparently be to solve, are taken seriously.

Read More