{"id":15202,"date":"2016-09-27T23:43:09","date_gmt":"2016-09-27T15:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/spacexs-elon-musk-announces-vision-for-colonizing-mars\/"},"modified":"2016-09-27T23:43:09","modified_gmt":"2016-09-27T15:43:09","slug":"spacexs-elon-musk-announces-vision-for-colonizing-mars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/spacexs-elon-musk-announces-vision-for-colonizing-mars\/","title":{"rendered":"SpaceX\u2019s Elon Musk announces vision for colonizing Mars"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_18809\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-18809\" style=\"width: 675px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-18809\" src=\"http:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/IAC-2016-07708-web-2-copy-2.jpg\" alt=\"Elon Musk presents his Mars colonization vision at the International Astronautical Congress on Tuesday in Guadalajara, Mexico. Credit: Tim Dodd\/Spaceflight Now\/www.timdoddphotography.com\" width=\"675\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/IAC-2016-07708-web-2-copy-2.jpg 675w, https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/IAC-2016-07708-web-2-copy-2-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 675px) 100vw, 675px\"><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-18809\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Elon Musk presents his Mars colonization vision at the International Astronautical Congress on Tuesday in Guadalajara, Mexico. Credit: Tim Dodd\/Spaceflight Now\/www.timdoddphotography.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk on Tuesday outlined an ambition to send humans to Mars with methane-fueled reusable spaceships and the largest rocket ever built, an effort he said will likely require government support and initially cost billions of dollars to develop and test.<\/p>\n<p>Musk\u2019s rollout of his Mars colonization vision, a glitzy reveal years in the making, included a description of an architecture that could eventually ferry more than 100 people to the red planet on each expedition, and perhaps thousands if SpaceX and its partners could muster support to build a fleet of boosters and airliner-sized spaceships.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat I want to do is make Mars seem possible, to make it seem as if it\u2019s something we can do in our lifetimes, and that you can go,\u201d Musk said.<\/p>\n<p>SpaceX plans to launch its first mission to Mars, a robotic test flight with a modified Dragon capsule, as soon as May 2018. After that \u201cRed Dragon\u201d flight, Musk said SpaceX\u2019s goal is to send at least one spacecraft to Mars during every interplanetary launch opportunity, which come every 26 months or so.<\/p>\n<p>The concept detailed Tuesday features a huge rocket standing 400 feet (122 meters) tall, and a fleet of passenger-carrying spaceships and refueling tankers.<\/p>\n<p>Musk\u2019s long-term vision is to build a self-sustaining civilization on Mars, complete with \u201ciron foundries and pizza joints.\u201d Eventually, it might have a million residents or more.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen will we reach that million person threshold? It\u2019s probably between 20 and 50 total Mars rendezvouses,\u201d Musk said, counting Mars launch windows occurring every other year. \u201cIt\u2019s&nbsp;probably anywhere from 40 to 100 years to fully achieve a self-sustaining civilization on Mars.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He counts those numbers from the time of the first crewed flight, which might some as soon as the 2020s.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe aspire to launch in late 2024 with an arrival in early 2025,\u201d Musk told reporters after his presentation at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico. \u201cThat\u2019s optimistic, so I would describe that as an aspiration and within the realm of possibility, but a lot of things need to go right. That said, I don\u2019t think it would be significantly beyond that if it did go later.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"678\" height=\"381\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0qo78R_yYFA?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Musk\u2019s presentation Tuesday proposes a wildly different way to travel to Mars than a plan developed by NASA, which is building its own powerful rocket, the expendable Space Launch System based on space shuttle-era propulsion systems, and Orion spaceships for a series of astronaut flights around the moon in the 2020s for long-distance shakedown cruises, then to orbit Mars some time in the mid-2030s.<\/p>\n<p>NASA and international astronaut crews in Mars orbit could operate rovers exploring the surface in real-time \u2014 without the communications lag between Mars and Earth \u2014 visit the Martian moon Phobos, and conduct other investigations ahead of a landing that might perhaps happen as soon as the end of the 2030s.<\/p>\n<p>SpaceX\u2019s Mars architecture, dubbed the Interplanetary Transport System, is designed with a long-term base and city in mind.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is different from Apollo,\u201d Musk said.<\/p>\n<p>Musk established SpaceX in 2002 with a $100 million investment, money he earned after co-founding PayPal and selling the online payment company to eBay. He wanted to put an unpiloted lander on Mars to grow plants in the planet\u2019s rust-colored soil, but balked at high rocket prices and a shaky launch market when he tried to purchase a Russian booster to dispatch his small-scale biosphere from Earth.<\/p>\n<p>Founded in a workshop in suburban Los Angeles, SpaceX\u2019s objectives from the beginning were to reduce the cost and complexity of spaceflight, and extend humanity\u2019s reach into the solar system and become a multi-planet species.<\/p>\n<p>Musk\u2019s company has developed a series of Falcon rockets since 2002 with an eye toward achieving SpaceX\u2019s first goal.<\/p>\n<p>First came the Falcon 1, a relatively simple booster with a single first stage engine to loft about a half-ton of cargo into low Earth orbit. The Falcon 1\u2019s first three missions all failed, nearly putting SpaceX out of business.<\/p>\n<p>But the Falcon 1 had two successes on the heels of the failures, giving NASA confidence to award SpaceX a $1.6 billion contract in December 2008 to supply cargo and provisions to the International Space Station\u2019s crew after the space shuttle\u2019s retirement.<\/p>\n<p>The commercial cargo deal was a turning point for SpaceX, which used government and private investments to develop the larger Falcon 9 launcher and Dragon supply ship for space station servicing flights. The Falcon 9\u2019s relatively low price, around $60 million, has also attracted commercial satellite owners to book flights on SpaceX\u2019s workhorse launcher.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_18810\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-18810\" style=\"width: 675px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-18810\" src=\"http:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/27294263035_5236360c9a_k-2.jpg\" alt=\"File photo of a Falcon 9 launch. Credit: SpaceX\" width=\"675\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/27294263035_5236360c9a_k-2.jpg 675w, https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/27294263035_5236360c9a_k-2-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 675px) 100vw, 675px\"><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-18810\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">File photo of a Falcon 9 launch. Credit: SpaceX<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>SpaceX says it has a backlog of more than 70 missions worth more than $10 billion.<\/p>\n<p>Those figures include piloted missions under a $2.6 billion contract signed with NASA in 2014 to design and certify a highly-modified Dragon capsule \u2014 called Crew Dragon, or Dragon 2 \u2014 to carry astronauts to and from the space station.<\/p>\n<p>Boeing won a similar contract for its CST-100 Starliner crew capsule, giving NASA two routes for crews to reach the orbiting research laboratory.<\/p>\n<p>But SpaceX has run into recent trouble with the Falcon 9, the launcher intended for the company\u2019s crew flights to low Earth orbit, with a pair of failures last year and Sept. 1. Musk said SpaceX has not lost a contract in the wake of the mishaps, but the Falcon 9 is grounded until engineers can root out the cause of the most recent explosion, which occurred during a ground test at Cape Canaveral and destroyed the rocket and its Israeli-owned communications satellite payload.<\/p>\n<p>SpaceX needs revenue from its commercial satellite launches to help fund Musk\u2019s Mars voyages, which he envisions will be a public-private partnership.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s going to be a challenge to fund this whole endeavor, but we do generate very decent cash flow from launching lots of satellites and servicing the space station,\u201d Musk said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUltimately, this is going to be a huge public-private partnership,\u201d Musk said. \u201cThat\u2019s how the United States was established, and many other countries around the world, through public-private partnerships.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Musk projected the cost of the Interplanetary Transport System around $10 billion before the commercial effort begins making money to recoup the investment. SpaceX is currently spending \u201ca few tens of millions of dollars\u201d on the effort, he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRight now, we\u2019re just trying to make as much progress as we can with the resources that we have available so to keep moving forward, and hopefully, I think&nbsp;as we show that this is possible, that this dream is real and not just a dream, that it is something that could be made real, I think the support will snowball over time,\u201d Musk said.<\/p>\n<p>He added that he is making the initial investments himself.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe main reason I\u2019m personally accumulating assets is in order to fund this,\u201d Musk said. \u201cI really don\u2019t have any other motivation for personally accumulating assets, except to be able to make the biggest contribution I can to making life mutli-planetary.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Why set up a city on Mars? To ensure the human species survives a massive extinction event on Earth, like an asteroid impact, war or a plague, Musk said.<\/p>\n<p>The moon is not an good option because it lacks an atmosphere, has weaker gravity than Mars, and lacks resources like large reservoirs of frozen ice and carbon dioxide that could be converted into water, air and rocket propellant on the red planet.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn general, Mars is much better suited to being able to scale up to become a self-sustaining civilization,\u201d Musk said.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_18811\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-18811\" style=\"width: 675px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-18811\" src=\"http:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/29937258946_c5f0ec30fb_h.jpg\" alt=\"Artist's illustration of SpaceX's huge Mars-class booster launching from launch pad 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Credit: SpaceX\" width=\"675\" height=\"288\" srcset=\"https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/29937258946_c5f0ec30fb_h.jpg 675w, https:\/\/spaceflightnow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/29937258946_c5f0ec30fb_h-300x128.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 675px) 100vw, 675px\"><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-18811\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Artist\u2019s illustration of SpaceX\u2019s huge Mars-class booster launching from launch pad 39A at NASA\u2019s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Credit: SpaceX<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>SpaceX\u2019s Mars mission design drew immediate comparisons to NASA\u2019s plan, but Musk avoided explicitly advocating for his concept over the government\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it\u2019s good for there to be multiple paths to Mars,\u201d Musk said. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t suggest any attempt at interplanetary travel be canceled. I think it\u2019s good to have multiple irons in the fire.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Musk added that he hopes the international community, with a wide presence at the global space conference in Mexico this week, is interested in building Mars-class rockets and spaceships similar to the ones described in his presentation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it\u2019s better for the world if there are multiple companies or organizations building interplanetary spacecraft,\u201d Musk said. \u201cThe more, the better. Anything, I think, that improves the probability of the future is good, and multiple companies doing it, I think, would be great.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>John Logsdon, a respected space historian and founder of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University, said the unveiling of the details of SpaceX\u2019s Mars plan will \u201cstimulate&nbsp;thinking, stimulate ideas, and maybe stimulate enough public support so NASA gets the funding it needs to actually do what it says it wants to do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While Musk was circumspect about getting support from NASA, he said he hopes the space agency will offer support in the way it did to SpaceX\u2019s Falcon 9 rocket and the first version of its Dragon spaceship, which were kick-started by hundreds of millions of dollars of NASA seed money.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn the future, there may be a NASA contract, there may not be, I don\u2019t know,\u201d Musk said. \u201cIf there is, that\u2019s a good thing. If there\u2019s not, probably it\u2019s not a good thing, but there are larger issues at stake here. Are we going to become a multi-planet species or not? Not pedestrian questions of if it\u2019s public or private, or what are the percentages? There are sort of small and tawdry questions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But Mars will require money, and it is not clear whether NASA will support a plan that could damage programs like the SLS and Orion vehicles, which have widespread, bipartisan support in Congress.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a vision, it\u2019s not a plan yet,\u201d Logsdon said of Musk\u2019s presentation in an interview with Spaceflight Now. \u201cI think a lot of technical details are not fully fleshed out, and certainly the non-technical part is very schematic in how anybody\u2019s going to pay for this, who\u2019s going to do it, and all that.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBold visions are good. They stimulate. Elon said he\u2019s offering this to the world as one way to do it, and he hopes people organize around it. He would like to do it, obviously, but it was good that he said he is not trying to undercut NASA. He\u2019s not competing \u2026 Let the marketplace of Mars plans sort it out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><b><i>Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Elon Musk presents his Mars colonization vision at the International Astronautical Congress on Tuesday in Guadalajara, Mexico. Credit: Tim Dodd\/Spaceflight Now\/www.timdoddphotography.com SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk on Tuesday outlined an ambition to send humans to Mars with methane-fueled reusable spaceships and the largest rocket ever built, an effort he said will likely require government support [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1045,3568,3570,3575,367,316],"class_list":["post-15202","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-elon-musk","tag-iac-2016","tag-international-astronautical-congress","tag-interplanetary-transport-system","tag-mars","tag-spacex"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15202"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15202"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15202\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}