The conquest of the mask

The American entrepreneur presented the prototype of the spacecraft, where he is going to send the first expedition to Mars

At the landfill near the village of Boka-Chika in Texas on the border with Mexico, engineers, builders and contractors of the SPACEX company led by Ilon gathered a 50-meter steel spacecraft-a prototype of the future star interplanetary squadron.

In love with steel

When three years ago in the Mexican Guadalahhar Ilon Musk told the world about the program of colonization of the Red Planet - the creation of a large interplanetary ship, which could deliver 100 people to Mars at once, he was considered a madman and a dreamer. Three years ago, the idea to launch 37 engines on one rocket seemed fantastic. But at the beginning of 2018, Mask launched Falcon Heavy with 27 engines. The most fantastic idea seemed to be a spaceship of reusable use, on which you can fly to the moon or Mars. And now Musk introduced the prototype of the ship Starship MK 1. Within one or two months, the head of SpaceX is going to conduct its test launch to a height of 20 km. At the same time, the company builds the second prototype MK 2 in Florida. Work on the third version will soon begin in Texas.

“This is the most inspiring thing that I have ever seen,” Ilon Musk said about Starship. Flights into space, according to him, give humanity "hope for a better future." Mask said that its space fleet will be important for maintaining humanity “alive and inspired”: “Of course, there are many problems in the world, they are important, and we must solve them. But we also need things that help to feel life. ”

Musk wrote on Twitter that the development of Mars will help life on Earth: “By deciding how to make a good climate of Mars, we will learn a lot about how to do it on Earth.”

A few days after the presentation, the company's video frames were posted on the company's website, giving some idea of ​​the internal structure of Starship Mk 1. Musk hopes that the ship will be able to reach orbit after 6 months. To launch the ship into orbit, a new missile is created called Falcon Super Heavy 68 meters long and a diameter of 9 m. The rocket can be equipped with various combinations of Raptor engines, from 24 to 37-depending on the task. The massive reusable missile that the company is building may be as powerful as the famous Saturn V, which delivered Apollo’s astronauts to the moon. “I think that we could see a flight with the crew next year if we can get to orbit after about six months,” Musk suggests.

Engineers will look for ways to reduce the mass of the spacecraft - the prototype weighs 200 tons (if it is filled with liquid methane and oxygen at the launch pad, it can weigh seven times more), and SpaceX intends to ultimately reduce the total mass to 110 tons to make the lifting capacity of the maximum. Mask wants the current reduced spaceship to be lifted in near -Earth orbit of 150 tons of useful cargo. This is more than any other launch system.

Later models of the spaceship will be a height of a 40-story building, notes the Business Insider publication.

Now the American media call the mask “a man of steel” as the protagonist of American comics - Superman. Mask received this nickname because he chose stainless steel for the external sheathing of a reusable interplanetary ship. “The best design decision that we made,” he said. Steel is heavier than carbon composite materials or materials based on aluminum used in most spacecraft, but has exceptional thermal properties. At very low temperatures, stainless steel-301 does not become fragile, and at very high temperatures (up to 1,500 degrees Celsius), when entering the atmosphere, does not melt. Therefore, the mask starship requires only a heat -shielding screen from thermal tiles.

Private business can count money. According to the mask, the material made of carbon fiber costs about 130 thousand dollars per ton. Stainless steel is sold for 2.5 thousand dollars per ton. “Steel is easily welded and resistant to weather conditions,” says the creator of Starship. -

We connected parts of the ship with welding right on the street. Honestly, I'm in love with steel. "

Journalists write: in the evening of the presentation of the ship under the stellar Texas sky, it seemed that Mars had become closer.

Problems with NASA

NASA administrator (his candidacy was proposed by President Trump), the former congressman-republican from Oklahoma Jim Brydenstein, restrainedly met Ilona Mask, recalling that the entrepreneur in debt to American taxpayers. As you know, after the closure of the 30-year-old “space shuttles” program, NASA immediately tried to create a new ship, but, faced with huge financial difficulties, turned to private business. The SpaceX Mask received $ 2.6 billion, and Boeing - 4.2 billion. NASA promised that the spacecraft of both companies would be put into operation in 2017.

In March of this year, the Crew Dragon capsule made a demonstration, unpitable flight, during which for a short time it was cooked with the International Space Station (ISS).

It was expected that in July the Mask company will conduct a test flight with the crew, but the device exploded during ground tests of the emergency salvation system.

The head of the agency said: “The manned private ship is lagging behind the schedule for years. NASA expects to see a similar level of enthusiasm, but focused on the investment of the American taxpayer. It's time to work them out. ” Braydenstein said that he wants to hold the contractors lifts to the years. And the most painful - depending on Russia continues. The “main space” official noted that NASA spends $ 85 million for one American astronaut on the Russian spacecraft launched to the ISS. So, while Musk is building ships to Mars, NASA pays for Russia additional places for the delivery of astronauts to the ISS in 2020.

Criticism did not like the mask. In an interview with CNN, he asked: did the head of NASA talk about him or about Boeing? SLS (Space Launch System) - a rocket for studying the far cosmos, which Boeing is building for NASA. The implementation of the Boeing project is late for years, billions of dollars have been revenged.

Musk assured NASA officials that 95% of the resources of his SpaceX company (money and personnel) are allocated to the Dragon spacecraft and the Falcon missile, and only 5% to the Martian starship. The Dragon ship, which will perform the first piloted SpaceX mission, will arrive at the launch site in Florida next month. If the mask succeeds, this will be the first launch from the American territory after July 2011. “If there is some way to just do it faster, I would have done it faster,” Musk said about Crew Dragon. However, at the construction site under the sight of the lenses, Musk and Brydenstein joked and smiled at each other.

And the last. A citizen of South Africa, Canada and the United States, an honorary member of the Royal Society of Britain, in other words, “Citizen of the World”, Elon Musk, is the most obvious example of the “global company” and “global cooperation”. Musk combined specialists from different countries in its private company to make a prosperous business and realize its long -standing dream of the “colonization” of space in the interests of all mankind.