SpaceX head Elon Musk took to the stage in Boca Chica, Texas on Thursday, Feb. 10 night. Standing underneath a spotlighted Starship atop a Super Heavy stack erected beside a launch tower and the now-recognizable “chopsticks” pincer arms—which had built the stack earlier—he laid out the anticipated future of Starship. Focusing on high-tempo “rapid reuse” launches, he provided a lot of vision but comparatively few new details in his presentation in front of a small crowd of locals, SpaceX staff, media and invited VIP’s.
He began by reaffirming points he’d made earlier about Starship: his desire to turn mankind into a “multiplanetary species,” the possibility of calamity, and even mankind’s responsibility to bring life to other worlds as “life’s stewards and life’s guardians.” More positively, he also said that inspiration was important as well, that “life can’t just be about solving problems, there have to be things that inspire you … that make you excited about the future,” and that becoming a “spacefaring civilization” will help to inspire people.
He also reminded the audience that NASA spending by the US Government is only 0.36% of its overall budget, and that space spending consumes only “a tenth of a percentage point” of national GDP, rebutting the critical (if now-diminishing) perception that space investment is an expensive boondoggle.
“Rapidly reusable launch system”
The key to achieving “multiplanetary” civilization, to Musk, is “a fully and rapidly reusable launch system.” He said that achieving that goal is central to the Starship project. Falcon 9 proved that reuse of both boost stage and faring is not just possible but economical, and with Starship they’re aiming for full and rapid reusability. Hence the unique “catcher” launch tower; taking off and landing at the same tower is a key component of rapid reusability.
Musk went on to say that they’re already aiming to have around 50 launches in 2022, but that they’re aiming to have each Starship be able to launch three times a week. Breaking out a tonnage chart, he showed that a single rapidly reusable Starship launching three times a week would carry 15,000 tons into orbit: as much as all the mass that has ever carried into space.
At full speed, however, they plan to be able to launch a single Starship three times a day. Ten Starships working at that pace could carry a million tons into orbit over the course of a year. Musk said that they plan to build far, far more than ten Starships.
This is based, Musk said, on having the ships be reusable every 6-8 hours, assuming “three orbits or more, and each orbit being 90 minutes.” The boosters, meanwhile, would be reusable every hour; “the propellant pumps are designed to refill a rocket in about half an hour,” and the boosters are intended to eventually be able to return to the launcher “in around six minutes.”
Musk said that “if you can do a million tons to earth orbit, that’s about a hundred thousand tons to the surface of Mars.” Since “you can only go to Mars every two years,” and since you need “at least a million tons on Mars to create a self-sustaining city,” this rapid Starship pace would be key to making that happen.
Musk thinks it’s best done sooner rather than later, as “civilization is a little fragile these days.” He also admitted that creating this Martian settlement will be “cramped, dangerous, difficult, very hard work, you might die … and that’s the sales pitch!” Returning to another frequent complaint, going to Mars will not ever be a convenient means to avoid Earth’s issues; it will be “extremely tough” at the very least.
Technical matters and the Raptor 2
Musk then moved on to more technical matters, though the presentation was still comparatively light on details. He discussed how the heat shield’s construction employs techniques reminiscent of “roofing tiles,” and that with their experience with International Space Station (ISS) docking will make orbital refueling comparatively straightforward. He showed the (already-well-known) dimensions of the Super Heavy, and said that the next booster will have 33 engines, up from 29.
After showing time-lapse footage of Starship 20 being placed on Super Heavy Booster 4, he also said that the tower was designed and built in 13 months, and that designing the launch system (which he described as “stage zero”) was “as complex and difficult as the booster or the ship.”
Musk then showed the Raptor 1 and Raptor 2 engines side-by-side; both on slides, and using two spotlighted physical engines near the audience. Musk said that the Raptor 2 is “significantly simplified”, and yet will be able to create 230 tons of thrust, and should be able to reach 250 tons of thrust with a bit more work. It also “costs half as much to build,” and is “a much easier engine to build.” Musk punctuated the engine comments by showing a quick Raptor 2 rocket firing test.
To close his prepared remarks, he turned to Starbase, explaining the importance of its location near the equator and comparatively clear area to launch eastward. After acknowledging the SpaceX role in the upcoming NASA Human Landing System Program and the “dearMoon” lunar tourism mission, they ran a short promotional animation of a future Starship taking off with a Super Heavy, separating, then traveling to Mars and landing outside a Martian colony.
Q&A reveals more details on Raptor, Starship, and FAA issues
After the video, Musk asked for questions.
Several questions were asked about the FAA and whether their environmental review would go in SpaceX’s favor. Musk had no direct information on that, though he was optimistic that they would not have to go to a full environmental impact statement, which could take years to resolve. An answer to a followup question revealed that SpaceX would likely move the launch testing to Florida if an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) was required, and that the move would likely set back Starship testing by up to 6-8 months as they build up their Florida infrastructure. In response to another question, he said that the hardware would be ready to go once the environmental review was resolved.
Another question was about point-to-point terrestrial transportation—possibly related to their recent DND contract. Musk said that “the interesting thing is that the capital efficiency is much better for a reusable rocket than for planes,” assuming enough distance, due to how comparatively cheap the propellants are.
Several questions also revolved around the Raptor 2 engine and how it was improved compared to the Raptor 1. Musk emphasized the simplification that was at the heart of the changes, removing and consolidating whatever components they could and replacing flanges and seals with welds wherever possible, calling flanges and seals “a nightmare” when dealing with the enormous temperatures and pressures seen in the Raptor 2. He’s hopeful they’ll even get to the point that they’ll be able to remove the engine shrouds, as they’re also a “huge pain.”
The biggest problem they’re still dealing with is the extreme heat, and ensuring that they have the proper cryogenic cooling so that the chamber doesn’t melt. Musk is confident that they’ll solve that problem shortly. After that, it’s just a question of production, and they’re looking to be producing seven or more Raptor 2 engines a week by next month. The advances made on the Raptor 2 engine is likely the the most understated and important technical achievement of the Starship program to date.
One question was about the amount of private vs. public investment in SpaceX and about the cost to launch. Musk replied by pointing out how SpaceX has created rockets that can carry tonnage to orbit at a fraction of previous costs, which benefits governments, and that the Starship development has cost a fraction of the development cost of the Saturn V while being “an order of magnitude more efficient than in the past.” He said that the cost for a Starship flight could eventually go down to as little as “a million dollars per flight,” depending on the launch tempo, and that he expects that it will likely be reduced to something around $10m in a few years.
Musk was asked about testing for orbital refilling (of oxygen and fuel), and said that testing for that will likely happen in the next few years; he was also asked about the interior design of a crewed Starship and said it was still a number of years off before they’d be looking closely at that issue. In response to several other questions on current and future clients, Musk said that they have upcoming Starship customers beyond their current ones, but that “I don’t want to steal their thunder.” He said he also doesn’t expect that SpaceX’s Human Landing System (HLS) mission work with NASA on the HLS to interfere with servicing new or existing Starship customers.
Finally, in response to several other questions, he said that they’re still looking into long-term life support solutions but could use a scaled-up Dragon life support system for shorter missions; that were still looking into developing their offshore rigs as launch facilities; and that Starship would not have a traditional “abort” mode but that Starship would have enough propulsion to pull free from a failed booster and land safely.
In total, while there were some technical discussions in the Q&A, this presentation was more about reinforcing SpaceX’s long-term goals and aspirations for Starship. It’s clear that Musk himself isn’t even quite sure what a future with million-dollar rocket launches will look like, but that he’s confident that a “rapid reuse” Starship fleet will make it happen and help bring humanity (and life itself) to Mars.
The first Starship customer and crew
This morning Jared Isaacman, founder and CEO of Shift4 and who recently led the Inspiration 4 mission, announced the Polaris Program.
The stated purpose of the Polaris Program is to be the “first-of-its-kind effort to rapidly advance human spaceflight capabilities, while continuing to raise funds and awareness for important causes here on Earth. The program will consist of up to three human spaceflight missions that will demonstrate new technologies, conduct extensive research, and ultimately culminate in the first flight of SpaceX’s Starship with humans on board.”
Once again Isaacman is partnering with SpaceX and the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
The mission will included three crewed launches, two using Falcon 9’s and the crew Dragon along with the first crewed mission of Starship. It will also include the first commercial spacewalk, the highest crew orbit and the first crew testing of Starlink in space.
The first mission will be called Polaris Dawn and the crew has already been selected and includes:
Mission Command Jared “Rook” Isaacman
- In addition to commanding Inspiration4, Isaacman has over 7,000 flight hours of aviation experience, including ratings in multiple experimental and ex-military aircraft. He set speed-around-the-world records in 2008 and 2009, as well as 100 air show performances as a member of the Black Diamond Jet Team, all of which were dedicated to charitable causes. In 2011, Isaacman co-founded what would become the world’s largest private air force, Draken International, to provide realistic adversary training for the United States Department of Defense.
Mission Pilot Scott “Kidd” Poteet
- Poteet is a retired U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel who served 20 years in various roles to include Commander of the 64th Aggressor Squadron, USAF Thunderbird Demonstration Pilot, #4 Slot, USAF Weapons School Graduate, Operational Test and Evaluation Pilot, and F-16 Flight Examiner. Kidd is a command pilot with over 3,200 flying hours in the F-16, A-4, T-38, T-37, T-3 and Alpha Jet. He logged over 400 hours of combat time in support of various Operations around the world. Following his Air Force career, Kidd served as the Director of Business Development at Draken International as well as the Vice President of Strategy at Shift4 Payments. He most recently served as the Mission Director of Inspiration4.
Mission Specialist Sarah Gillis
- Gillis is a Lead Space Operations Engineer at SpaceX, responsible for overseeing the company’s astronaut training program. This includes the development of mission-specific curriculum and training execution for both NASA and commercial astronauts who fly aboard the Dragon spacecraft. She prepared NASA astronauts for the first Demo-2 and Crew-1 missions, and most recently directly trained the Inspiration4 astronauts, the first all civilian crew to go to orbit. Sarah is an experienced mission control operator, who has supported real-time operations for Dragon’s cargo resupply missions to and from the International Space Station as a Navigation Officer, and as a crew communicator for Dragon’s human spaceflight missions.
Mission Specialist and Medical Officer Anna Menon
- Menon is a Lead Space Operations Engineer at SpaceX, where she manages the development of crew operations and serves in mission control as both a Mission Director and crew communicator. During her tenure at SpaceX, Menon has led the implementation of Dragon’s crew capabilities, helped create the crew communicator operator role, and developed critical operational responses to vehicle emergencies, such as a fire or cabin depressurization. Anna served in mission control during multiple cargo and crew Dragon missions, including Demo-2, Crew-1, CRS-22, and CRS-23. Prior to SpaceX, she worked for seven years at NASA as a biomedical flight controller for the International Space Station.
The Polaris Dawn mission is scheduled no earlier than the fourth quarter of 2022.