"These are unthinkable numbers, but we’re not breaking any physics to achieve this."
  • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    7 months ago

    I think he needed a new talking point. I don’t think most people believe he will have Starship preparing a base on Mars in 2022 anymore.
    Starship hasn’t even achieved orbital speed yet, and that was despite trying without a payload.
    Elon musk is high on drugs and himself, and has completely lost it.

    • BasketKees@lemmy.worldEnglish
      01·
      7 months ago

      They cut off the engines a couple of seconds before reaching orbital speed for safety. Until they prove they can control the ship on orbit they can’t risk having a 16 floor tall 125 ton steel tower coming down in a random location. This is unrelated to any of Elon’s shenanigans.

      There is nobody who knows even the slightest bit about space flight that doubts Starship can reach orbit.

      SpaceX has many things to get done to make Starship the fully reusable rocket they want it to be, but picking orbital speed is just about the weakest argument against it.

      • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        7 months ago

        Ah OK, I just heard they didn’t, and thought it was because they couldn’t.

        Still considering he claimed they’d be to Mars 2 years ago, and have manned flights to Mars this year, it’s obvious he hasn’t got a very solid plan for how or when to actually do it.

        • BasketKees@lemmy.worldEnglish
          11·
          7 months ago

          The how is pretty solid, SpaceX has a very strong track record. The uncertainty is mostly in the when.

          It is unfortunate that Elon’s state of mind has become more questionable. But SpaceX is a whole lot more than Elon and they have achieved remarkable things. Just take the Elon presentations with a boat load of salt (mostly concerning the timing) and enjoy the spectacle that SpaceX delivers. It is just ridiculous what they are aiming for and so far they seem to be able to deliver … eventually.

          • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            7 months ago

            so far they seem to be able to deliver

            Not as far as I know, what was it? SpaceX would make space travel 1000 times cheaper! Some ridiculous shit like that, and we’d soon have tourism on Mars. You have to be on freaking mushrooms to take anything about SpaceX seriously. Somehow they got a NASA contract, and I think they are beginning to regret that.

            • BasketKees@lemmy.worldEnglish
              1·
              7 months ago

              You left out a part in that quote, “eventually”. SpaceX have delivered on every NASA contract milestone, most (well) on time even which is unheard of in the space industry. SpaceX have fulfilled their first contract for delivering cargo humans to the ISS and is now on their second contract while Boeing is yet to deliver a single ounce human to the ISS for their first contract that they got before SpaceX got their first. SpaceX delivers, and for a good price as well. SpaceX have never claimed they would make space ‘travel’ 1000x cheaper. Their goal is to make it 1000x times cheaper to lift mass to orbit. Eventually. This is the whole reason for the Starship project. They have made it 5-10x cheaper with Falcon and a working version of the current incarnation of Starship could be 50-100x cheaper. Still a ways to go, but can’t say they aren’t delivering. Nobody else comes close. Which is why SpaceX (the company) will be shooting 90% of all mass to orbit worldwide this year. China (the country) will do about 6%. All other companies and countries together will do the remainder. Why? Mostly because they are by far the cheapest and partly because they are the only ones who can launch so often. Turns out landing a rocket and using it again was a pretty decent idea.

              SpaceX have never claimed we would have tourism to Mars soon. Even Elon has not claimed that. At best they would claim it is not outside the realm of possibility within the next few decades.

              The accomplishments of SpaceX are undisputed. Which makes it a shame to have such a negative opinion based on so little information in my view. I get a lot of joy from ignoring Elon and focussing on the progress of the company. They do remarkable things. As do others in the space industry and I enjoy following their progress as well.

              • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
                1·
                7 months ago

                They have made it 5-10x cheaper with Falcon

                Impressive if true, but have they really? I’d like to see a reliable source on that. That doesn’t compare to the most expensive previously existing option, which may have been the shuttle.

            • sorghum@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              01·
              7 months ago

              I mean they are doing missions to the ISS for the US and private corpos and just recently the bandwagon mission where they flew 9 satellites which they advertise a price for at $300,000 per. The axiom missions are $55,000,000 per seat. That’s not unreasonable for launches considering Artemis is $4,200,000,000 per launch ($1,050,000,000 per seat)

              I guess it’s just 19 times cheaper.