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Two Starships in "bolas" rotation
In article ,
says... Clearly, especially since the current NASA plan of record doesn't include Starship in any meaningful way. It still relies heavily on SLS/Orion, so we will be limited to one crewed mission per year. That's pretty weak sauce considering how "close" the moon is. Starship doesn't fit their desired architecture. Once they admit that Starship is real, all their plans and hardware go into a cocked hat. If you think the graphic Musk showed of Starship docked to ISS looked a little silly, imagine the same thing with the much smaller Gateway. This image is worth a thousand words: https://i.redd.it/64h5zvj1gex21.jpg It's part of this discussion: https://www.reddit.com/r/SpaceXLoung...ex_vs_blue_ori gin_2024_aspirations/ I think that the scale of Starship is something I think most people won't be able to wrap their mind around. It's just so fracking huge compared to anything planned by anyone to land crew on the moon or Mars that it's not even funny. SpaceX needs Starlink for the potential revenue to attract investors to develop Starship/Super Heavy. But SpaceX also needs Starship/Super Heavy to launch and maintain the Starlink constellation. You're starting to make this sound like trying to fly by tugging on your own bootstraps. SpaceX has gotten over a billion in investment and it is ALL going to StarLink (and none to Starship/Falcon Super Heavy). Agreed. Starlink must come first. That's a huge potential revenue stream that they'll need in order to fund a moon/Mars capable Starship. Mars is still Musk's ultimate goal, but Starlink will need to come first in order to provide the massive cash flow needed to turn Starship from a cargo launcher into a true crewed spaceship capable of performing an actual Mars mission. IMHO, of course. While I think Musk is overly optimistic (as usual), I think you are overly pessimistic. I'd bet on a manned Mars mission before 2030 with the potential for lunar missions before that. 2030 for a first crewed Mars mission is certainly optimistic, IMHO. I'd love to see that. And I think it might just be possible if enough development money is spent in all the right areas. But I also think it's safe to say that if this were any other online forum, we'd both be called a SpaceX fanboys and our opinions would be widely ridiculed. Until Starship/Super Booster start flying "routinely", the nay-sayers will keep saying that all of Musk's Mars aspirations are an Internet billionaire's fantasy. I'm also sure they'd say the same of Jeff Bezos's aspiration to start moving industry off earth and into space. That's what motivated him to start Blue Origin. 05.09.19 Jeff Bezos wants to save Earth by moving industry to space The billionaire owner of Blue Origin outlines plans for mining, manufacturing, and colonies in space. https://www.fastcompany.com/90347364...save-earth-by- moving-industry-to-space Jeff -- All opinions posted by me on Usenet News are mine, and mine alone. These posts do not reflect the opinions of my family, friends, employer, or any organization that I am a member of. |
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