It seems that SpaceXas reported by Elon Musk himself via Twitter, could be prepared for March of this year to try to complete the long-awaited orbital test flight of the Starship.“If the remaining tests go well, we will try to launch the Starship next month”Musk wrote in response to a tweet.
Of course, this SpaceX project is really ambitious. And it is that, even before having been put to the test, it can already be confirmed that it is a real beast. This measures 120 meters high and is theoretically capable of producing up to 7,590 tons of thrust at sea level. It is bigger, taller, heavier and more powerful than any other rocket launch story.
The simple fact of ensuring that the Starship can reach orbit It is a great challenge, although it will be even greater to recover it later. Also, there are no guarantees that early prototypes will be reusable even if they are recovered.
“From an environmental point of view”Musk explains, “obviously it’s also much better to ‘build a ‘fully reusable’ vehicle”, as rockets are traditionally thrown away after each launch. However, at the moment it is unknown if it will be possible.
Elon Musk sets a date for the launch of his Starship rocket: March
It is true that this date has varied over time, but looks like we might come to believe this is finally going to take place next month. Basically, in January Starship successfully completed its first fueling test, managing to successfully store 4.5 million kilos of liquid oxygen and methane without any problem.
On the other hand, SpaceX has also already carried out dress rehearsals for the countdown that it will have to complete on launch day, so it certainly could be trusted, at least this time, at its word. Of course, no official date has been established.
And it is that, before being able to take off, there would still be one more really important test to go. We are talking about the static ignition of the 33 Raptor engines. To date, the company has never fired more than 14 engines at a time, so it will be quite a challenge.
SpaceX has consistently reduced the cost of its current fleet of Falcon 9 rockets below $30 million per launch by landing the most expensive part of the rocket and reusing it multiple times. But even though Starship is larger and cost multi-million dollars to develop, Musk claims this will be less expensive per release. “I’m sure it will cost less than 10 million dollars”it states.
The central objective of the Starship is to transport cargo and groups of people beyond Earth. Elon Musk has always presented the rocket as crucial to establishing a human presence elsewhereas the Moon and Mars. Knowing all this, we can only wait.
Meanwhile, SpaceX’s multi-billion dollar contract to use Starship to return NASA astronauts to the Moon It is still on the table and we must add that the company already has many plans to build variants of it.