The @SpaceX Crew Dragon is rolled out to the launch pad and raised vertical ahead of the launch of @NASA astronauts @AstroBehnken & @Astro_Doug from @NASAKennedy to the @Space_Station. More #LaunchAmerica Photos: https://t.co/8due5jBg5Y pic.twitter.com/OeAeMIjxsh

— NASA HQ PHOTO (@nasahqphoto) May 21, 2020

On May 20, both astronauts arrived at Kennedy Space Center in preparations for the big day. Just a day later, May 21, Falcon 9 and Dragon were mated and raised vertical on Launch Complex 39A for an upcoming static fire.

NASA and SpaceX will conduct a Flight Readiness Review to resolve any final issues before launch day. On May 25, NASA will host a press conference to discuss the results of the Flight Readiness Review.

The finalized #SpaceX #CrewDragon launch weather commit criteria for next week. #Demo2 #Falonc9 #NASA pic.twitter.com/oyD0Bqacq4

— Chris G – NSF (@ChrisG_NSF) May 20, 2020

SpaceX is closely watching weather conditions for the 27th. According to Benji Reed, the SpaceX Director of Crew Management, says there is a “very high chance of scrub due to the weather.” If the mission is in fact delayed, the next available date is presumably three days later, May 30th. It is clear that SpaceX will be taking all of the precautions necessary for their first crewed launch.

In preparations for the launch, SpaceX also released some new infographics for the mission layout. It is similar to SpaceX’s Commercial Resupply Service missions.

You can watch the historic SpaceX launch on spacex.com and nasa.gov/live

SN4 passed cryo proof! ? pic.twitter.com/EJakThZRGF

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 27, 2020

The cryogenic proof test is a key assessment for SpaceX to hurdle over, and for Starship to be a success. For SN4’s predecessors, Mark 1, SN1, and SN3, all suffered a catastrophic anomaly during this test.

Starship SN3 destroyed in its cryogenic proof test. (Labpadre)

After the success of SN4, Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, tweeted that SN4 will perform a static fire “later this week” and a short 150 meter hop in May after regulatory approval. SpaceX was aiming for Wednesday, April 29 to conduct the static fire, however, the date was pushed back to Friday, May 1. What is interesting, however, Musk confirmed that the SN4 will conduct the static fire and 150 meter hop with only one raptor engine, when previously speculated to have three raptor engines installed. Not to worry though, Musk later confirmed that Starship SN5, SN4’s successor, will be fitted with three raptor engines.

Just one. SN5 will get three.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 27, 2020

Raptor Engine spotted heading to Boca Chica launchpad to be installed onto Starship SN4. (Labpadre)

In addition to the triple raptor engines, Starship SN5 will be fitted with aero flaps for the much anticipated 20 kilometer hop. The aero flaps will possibly look similar to Starship Mark 1.

Flaps, actuator & static aero are undergoing redesign for mass reduction & simplicity

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 17, 2020

Starship Mark 1 (Darrell Etherington)

You can watch Starship SN4’s cryogenic proof test below.

Two days ago, SpaceX launched 60 more satellites to a total of 420 satellites that were previously launched. Elon Musk confirmed this in a tweet:

There are now 420 operational Starlink satellites ? ?

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 22, 2020

These satellites will be low enough for people to see but they will eventually be invisible to telescopes. A twitter user asked Elon Musk about how many launches are left for minor/moderate coverage. Elon Musk responded that public beta will follow after private in 6 months.
Elon Musk also confirmed this in a tweet:

Private beta begins in ~3 months, public beta in ~6 months, starting with high latitudes

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 23, 2020

Areas with poor internet connection will be the first to have the satellite internet access in August of this year. According to Popular Mechanics, one third of rural Americans do not have high-speed internet. These areas include “university towns and government laboratory areas-places with small populations with no research facilities.” Areas with high altitude, like Germany, will also be included in the first beta trials.

This all is in line with SpaceX’s goal of global coverage will take about 12,000 satellites. Launching is projected to complete by 2021.

SpaceX’s plan for public access using Starlink Satellites is ambitious to say the least, especially during a global pandemic. It will be interesting to see how the plan plays out with new everyday complications.

SpaceX enthusiasts spotted multiple heat shield tiles bolted onto the hull of the rocket. If SN4 takes off, the heatshield will undergo extensive thermal and acoustic tests. This would be similar to the heat shield tests SpaceX conducted when Starhopper took its flight in August.

Starship SN4’s propellant section inside the vehicle assembly building with heat shield tiles installed on the hull.

Tonight StarHopper has a new look. Some heatshield tiles have been attached prior to the 200 meter hop. ????@NASASpaceflighthttps://t.co/SjL3FLBlPE pic.twitter.com/w0hZbwcLW3

— Mary (@BocaChicaGal) August 15, 2019

In a tweetstorm from Musk on April 15, the CEO revealed that the flaps and aero actuators of Starship are in the process of a mass reduction and simplicity redesign. However, he mentioned no aero surfaces will be installed on SN4, but “SN5 or SN6 will get flaps.”

Flaps, actuator & static aero are undergoing redesign for mass reduction & simplicity

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 17, 2020

In other Starship news, the raptor engine production is progressing as fast as Starship itself. SpaceX is currently on SN26 of their raptor iteration. This information comes two weeks after Musk released a photo of three raptor engines that were supposedly meant to be installed on SN3 before its anomaly. The raptor engines in the image below will likely be fitted onto SN4 if it succeeds in its pressure testing. It is also interesting to note that a Super Heavy booster would require 37 raptor engines. For SpaceX to meet Musk’s goal of producing one Starship per week, SpaceX must increase their rate of raptor engine production even faster than it already is.

SN26

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 16, 2020

SpaceX enthusiasts could expect to see testing of SN4 as early as next week. Cameron County recently added road closure dates for pressure testing and a potential short flight. The dates currently issued are April 20, April 23, and April 26. With backup dates of April 27 and April 28, respectively.

Starship (formally known as BFR) is SpaceX’s in-development rocket that is supposedly Mars capable. Producing more than two times the thrust of the Saturn V, the most powerful rocket ever built, Starship will be the most powerful rocket ever built and be able to send 100 people or 100 metric tons to Earth orbit or the surface of Mars. However, this is all thanks to its fully-reusable design. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has emphasized the importance of reusable rockets many times and compares them with aviation technology. He stated during the 67th International Astronautical Congress that “with air travel when you fly a plane, you fly that plane many times. Any mode of transport, whether it’s a plane, a horse, a bicycle, is reusable. You use that mode of transport many times. And if you had to get a new plane every time you flew somewhere, and even have two planes for a return journey, very few people could afford to fly.”

However, before a 6-month journey to Mars, SpaceX needs to verify that Starship can complete its required pressure tests. The predecessors to SN3, mark 1, and SN1, both failed its pressure tests and resulted in an explosion and a rapid unscheduled disassembly. However, SN2, a stripped-down version of Starship, did complete the required criteria, which was later confirmed by Musk on twitter. Stating, “SN2 (with thrust puck) passed cryo pressure & engine thrust load tests late last night.”

With the success of SN2, a favorable outcome for Starship SN3 does seem promising. If the tests are indeed successful with SN3, this would verify the strength of the welds of its tank section and further confirm that SN3 would be able to take the thrust loads of the powerful raptor engines.

SpaceX enthusiasts can expect to see tests occur in just a matter of a few days. Cameron Country, Texas, has already placed multiple road closures on Highway 4 and Boca Chica Beach in preparation for the upcoming tests. Road closures are placed for April 1st and April 6th with their backup dates, respectively. April 1st is scheduled for a static fire and April 6th for a 150-meter hop. Both tests will be firsts for Starship.

Musk aims to eventually produce one Starship per week and is certainly keeping his promise. The SpaceX Boca Chica site has seen unprecedented rapid progress in the development of their Starship construction site. The company managed to assemble Starship SN3 in less than a month after SN1 suffered an unfortunate anomaly. The stainless steel rings and bulkheads for the next iteration of the Starship prototype, SN4, has already been spotted by local SpaceX enthusiasts and is most likely already being assembled. The future for SpaceX seems very promising and thrilling.

Watch SN3 being rolled out to its launchpad in the video below.

The imagined colony is in the Gale Crater, so it’s a bit south of Mars’ equator on the Eastern hemisphere and that is also the same place NASA’s Mars Curiosity Rover landed on August 6, 2012. Interestingly, the simulation actually has a monument set outside the colony commemorating Curiosity. Its topography and geography are based on the actual map data collected by Mars satellites and rovers which are then given to BBI. So, with that data, users can experience sunsets, sunrises, virtual days and nights. This area is also close to the Elysium Planitia which is where NASA’s InSight lander arrived recently.

Several unique features can be experienced in the simulation. The primary region is the “Dome Complex” which is where a very large biodome made possible because of Mars’ low gravity, called the Eagle Dome, is located. It gives Earth-like ecosystem for the colonists. The dome is protected from radiation but a little bit of light is allowed to come through just so the colonists don’t experience claustrophobia. The environment also allows to walk free without a spacesuit on. In order to support the dome and other areas where colonists are living and working, several ponds of algae are created that are supposed to generate oxygen and be a source of food supplements.

Outside of the dome are condo-blocks which are primary residences for human occupants. Material from Mars have been used to created the condo-blocks and are connected to a system of underground tunnels. They are also protected from radiation so the occupants can live freely without spacesuits. In order for the progress to be realistically shown in the colonization effort, legacy “hab” pods and an old launch pad are present, together with little blurbs about the colony’s development history.

Power is provided through nuclear fission reactors, Earth providing the environment with the Uranium every few years on resupply missions. Water treatment facilities connected to the wells on Mars are there alongside a few satellite dishes creating a communications array where Martian internet has been established.

Project Eagle was first introduced in 2017 at the annual D.I.C.E. (Design, Innovate, Communicate, Entertain) Summit hosted by the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences. In the presentation hosted by Dr. Jeff Norris, Mission Operations Innovation Lead of NASA’s JPL, the game studio was encouraged to create the game be more than just entertainment for the audience. He said art was an inspiration for an appealing vision for the future of space exploration. “Great art doesn’t just move us as individuals – it can move entire societies,” he stated on stage. He then made a connection with the originator of ‘’space art’’, artist Chelsey Bonestell, and the public’s directly inspired support of the later Moon missions. The simulation is now available to use and can be found on Steam.

Only when the 21st rocket launch of the year happened on Saturday did he reveal that construction of a prototype for a Mars spaceship – Starship – is now underway at the company’s Texas launch site.

But that’s not all. The first round of experimental launches, called the ‘’test hopper’’, should be completed by spring.

Both Elon Musk and Gwynne Shotwell, the president and COO of SpaceX, have said that those ‘’hops’’, or short launches that don’t reach the orbit of such a spaceship prototype, is a very important step towards building the Big Falcon Rocket, or BFR. Such a rocket, a colossal two-stage system, is designed to launch 100 people and 150 tons of cargo to the surface of Mars.

However, both of them said recently that those ‘’hops” won’t begin until the end of 2019. It’s probable that cleverness and funding of half a billion dollars has helped the process to speed up a bit.

Starship is designed to be about 30 feet wide and 180 feet tall, and sit atop a roughly 219-foot-tall rocket booster that Musk now calls Super Heavy.

“I will do a full technical presentation of Starship after the test vehicle we’re building in Texas flies, so hopefully March/April,” Musk tweeted on Saturday.

“This test hopper is at full body diameter of 9m / 30 ft, just not full height. Super Heavy will be full height & diameter,” he also added with it signifying that SpaceX won’t build a squat version of Super Heavy but will actually go straight to launching a full-scale booster.

Musk also stated that the test hopper construction was ongoing at SpaceX’s new rocket factory at the Port of Los Angeles.

A launch site for BFR is being developed in Boca Chica, Texas, and locals have already taken several pictures of parts of test hopper arriving on site and being assembled.

The image below is an illustration of test hopper parts against the illustrations of Spaceship.

However, SpaceX hasn’t relieved any further details about the Starship test hopper’s launch schedule and other information (and the images are not confirmed to show the hopper).

Launch schedule and test hopper weren’t the only news revealed on Saturday.

Possible first landings on Mars in 2025

Musk disclosed details about SpaceX’s activities over discussion of metallurgy, or properties and science of metals, for the BFR.

Materials are very important for space vehicles because they need to handle massive temperature and pressure changes, as well as extreme vibration. It’s especially important for Starship because it’s supposed to launch into orbit around Earth, travel for months to Mars, land on its surface, and then launch back home.

Musk showed what it’s supposed to be a ‘’final iteration” of BFR in September. He also announced that the company would be launching Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa around the moon in 2023. Musk described the design to be rich with carbon-fiber composite parts.

However, by November, Musk said that the radical changes were coming, even renaming two main parts of BFR system (Starship used to be called “Big Falcon Spaceship” and Super Heavy the “Big Falcon Booster.”). In December, it was reported by Teslarati that SpaceX and NASA were working together to develop a new type of heat shield for Starship.

And this Saturday, Musk announced that SpaceX established a special stainless steel alloy for its BFR system.

Because of these changes, it’s now unknown whether SpaceX will manage to meet its timeline for the launch in March. But by October 31, Musk hopes he will use the BFR system to launch the first humans towards the surface of Mars in 6 years time.

“We’re still aiming for 2024,” Musk commented about the mission during an interview with journalist Kara Swisher for the podcast Recode Decode.

SpaceX is planning to launch a massive network of satellites into orbit to give internet service for devices on the ground. That would give an alternative to cellular. SpaceX still hasn’t revealed which company it would be targeting with this service though. Nevertheless, it’s possible that it would fill a need in the IoT that would give the company a large income stream.

SpaceX is having plans to get its Starlink internet service off the ground with the new capital. This satellite-based network would need a web of thousands of satellites for it to be able to cover the entire planet.

The US government has approved more than 11 thousand satellites in total. The company launched two test units into orbit in February to start examining how the service would turn out and what the company would need to scale its operations.

A new round of funding will allow the company to improve testing and eventually move into the early commercial deployment. However, getting the satellites into orbit would most likely require extra funding, apart from the $500 million.

The satellite-based internet service could be a huge advantage for the IoT if SpaceX includes low-power services in its network. Several companies are planning to test and eventually deploy commercial satellite networks which would be equipped particularly for IoT use cases, that includes Iridium, Astrocast, and Ligado. These companies are trying to make the spacefaring networks to serve IoT devices. The reason for that is because they are a good alternative to cellular-based communications and usually function on different wavelengths because of the distances that signals have to travel.

This kind of internet service can give much better coverage because it doesn’t need fixed access points like a cellular network does. So, distant areas aren’t a problem and companies are able to use only one network worldwide.

On the other hand, satellite networks have higher initial expenses and therefore are more expensive, which can limit their value. With SpaceX’s new funding, investor relationships, and income from its rocketry business, the company could possibly move past the problem of the initial investment needed to get satellites into orbit.

If everything goes well, SpaceX will have a rather bountiful market considering the projected explosion in cellular IoT connections in upcoming years.

It may look like it’s a bowl of fresh snow released by European Space Agency (ESA) on Dec. 20th, but it’s actually an ice deposit chilling the air that is moving above it, as stated by the agency.

The crater is called “Korolev Crater” and the ice can be found in the deepest parts of its foundation and while the air is moving over the ice, it cools it down and sinks it, creating cold air right above the chilly deposit.

ESA officially named this phenomenon a “cold trap” because it looks like the air is keeping the crater from becoming permanently icy.

Korolev Crater is 82 km across, which is about 51 miles, found just south of terrain that wraps around Olympia Undae, Mars’ northern polar cap. The crater floor is even deeper than Earth’s Grand Canyon – it can reach depths of even 1.2 miles below its rim.

The High Resolution Stereo Camera on the space agency’s Mars Express satellite managed to take shots of the crater’s five different ‘’strips’’ and each of those shots came from a different orbit of the spacecraft. They were combined and made into a single image.

Mars Express is actually linked with Christmas as well. After about 6 months travelling from Earth, the mission first fired its engine to enter Martian orbit on Dec. 25, 2003. Mars Express is the first spacecraft of the agency to explore another planet, however its high-resolution stereoscopic camera and mineralogical mapping spectrometer failed shortly after being launched on Nov.16 of 1996.

These are accomplishments which should not be taken lightly. These rapid developments have shown that SpaceX has the ability to take on incredible technical challenges and accomplish them. The next immediate goals for the company are now to have more frequent launches with the Falcon Heavy, which launched successfully earlier in 2018, and to have a manned flight in the dragon space capsule. However, these are just minor goals along the way to accomplishing Elon’s master plan.

From the beginning, the plan has been to get to Mars, period. Elon has stated numerous reasons why he wants this, the most important being the survival of our species. As we now know, our planet is fragile and humanity has not had a good impact on it. If we continue on the same pace as we are now, our planet may one day be inhospitable. Or who knows, maybe a giant asteroid will hit our planet and cause massive devastation. Regardless of what happens, Mars can be seen as a life boat for humanity itself. On its surface are all the materials needed for humans to survive and, perhaps one day, to thrive. We have discovered water, oxygen can be extracted from the CO2 currently making up the Martian atmosphere, and building materials are readily available. A self-sustaining colony would take decades of development, cost billions of dollars, and provide little economic incentive, however, those are problems for another day. The first step is to get there.

So far SpaceX has only ventured outside our planet’s gravity once. Essentially an intergalactic shot in the dark to show they are serious about Mars. The secondary goal of the inaugurating test flight of the Falcon Heavy, currently the world’s most powerful rocket, was to put a Tesla Model S into orbit around Mars. However, this did not go according to plan and the Tesla missed the mark and is now in orbit around the Sun instead. Regardless of the minor directional control issues on the later stage, this launch showed that SpaceX could successfully launch a huge multistage rocket and delivery a payload deep into interstellar space. Even though the Falcon Heavy has been active for less than a year, SpaceX is already beginning to develop its next rocket, the one that will send mankind for Mars.

This rocket has been named Starship and its specs are impressive. It will be almost 400 feet tall, supply about 14 million pounds of thrust, and be able to send over 100,000 kilograms of equipment to the surface of Mars. The plan right now is to send the rocket into Low Earth Orbit (LEO) around the Earth and then refuel it for the journey to Mars. This allows the rocket to carry more supplies more efficiently. This rocket will also be completely reusable and be capable of making multiple trips to and from Mars, drastically reducing the cost of each flight. Even though it is still in the development phase, this rocket has the power to send mankind to its next evolutionary step. Similar to the Saturn V which carried Neil Armstrong to the moon, or even the Santa Maria which sent Columbus to the New World, this ship, carrying Elon Musk’s vision, has the power to carry the torch of humanity to a new planet. Expect big news from SpaceX in the next decade.