{"id":18687,"date":"2017-12-23T00:46:47","date_gmt":"2017-12-22T16:46:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/a-car-for-mars-elon-musk-shows-tesla-roadster-revving-up-for-falcon-heavy-liftoff\/"},"modified":"2017-12-23T00:46:47","modified_gmt":"2017-12-22T16:46:47","slug":"a-car-for-mars-elon-musk-shows-tesla-roadster-revving-up-for-falcon-heavy-liftoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/a-car-for-mars-elon-musk-shows-tesla-roadster-revving-up-for-falcon-heavy-liftoff\/","title":{"rendered":"A car for Mars: Elon Musk shows Tesla Roadster revving up for Falcon Heavy liftoff"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tesla
Elon Musk\u2019s red Tesla Roadster is nestled within the payload shroud for a Falcon Heavy rocket. (Elon Musk via Instagram)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After a flurry of speculation, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is showing off his midnight cherry-red Tesla Roadster sports car as it\u2019s being prepared for its ride atop a Falcon Heavy rocket.<\/p>\n

Liftoff from Launch Complex 39A at NASA\u2019s Kennedy Space Center in Florida is currently set for next month, and if all goes as planned, the car will be put into a long, looping trajectory bridging the orbits of Earth and Mars.<\/p>\n

\u201cA Red Car for the Red Planet,\u201d Musk wrote in the Instagram post that accompanied pictures of the car. Scroll down for the complete post:<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/BdA94kVgQhU\/<\/p>\n

From the start, Musk said he wanted to use the Falcon Heavy\u2019s maiden launch to send the silliest thing he could think of into space. The goal was to outdo the Monty Pythonesque wheel of cheese that SpaceX included aboard the first flight of its Dragon cargo capsule.<\/p>\n

Musk\u2019s motivation isn\u2019t completely frivolous: As he conceded in July, the first flight of the Falcon Heavy, bristling with 27 Merlin engines on its three-core booster, carries a significant chance of failure. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot that could go wrong there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Rather than putting someone else\u2019s pricey payload on the rocket, Musk wanted to use what\u2019s commonly known as a \u201cmass simulator\u201d \u2014 a test object that\u2019s massive enough to stand in for the typical payload that the Falcon Heavy would carry. So why not make it memorable?<\/p>\n

Musk chose his own red Roadster sports car, and will have it braced within the Falcon Heavy\u2019s payload shroud for deployment after launch. Its trajectory would follow a stable \u201cHohmann transfer orbit\u201d stretching out as far as Mars but requiring no additional propulsive push.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the thought of a car drifting apparently endlessly through space and perhaps being discovered by an alien race millions of years in the future,\u201d Musk explained in a tweet earlier this month.<\/p>\n

As the cherry on the sports-car sundae, Musk wants to have David Bowie\u2019s \u201cSpace Oddity\u201d playing on the sound system as the Roadster goes into space. That\u2019s not all: He\u2019s already agreed to put a miniaturized edition of Isaac Asimov\u2019s Foundation Trilogy on board, and there are likely to be other goodies as well. Who knows \u2026 maybe even a wheel of cheese.<\/p>\n

Postscript:<\/strong> Even before Musk posted his pictures, a bootlegged snapshot showing the Roadster perched atop the Falcon Heavy\u2019s payload attach fitting made its way to several online forums, and was tweeted out. There was no way to verify that the photo was authentic last night, but based on the Roadster\u2019s configuration as shown in Musk\u2019s pictures, it looks as if the leaked version was legit.<\/p>\n