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the starship will be launched in 2 years and manned mars flight will be carried out within 4 years!

musk revealed his latest mars plan and said that a human settlement will be established within 20 years.

lao ma's post immediately caused a stir, with netizens saying all kinds of things:

boycott those who only make empty promises:

a sense of déjà vu, this question is familiar to me!

an action-oriented netizen who used ai to turn himself into an astronaut:

old ma! i'm ready! send me to mars!

pessimistic netizens:

this is too exaggerated. i don’t know if i can see it in my lifetime…

on the contrary, the optimistic netizens:

that's good, at least we are getting closer~

and the ruthless and grumpy brother:

didn't they say in 2011 that they would send humans to mars within 10 years? yet they haven't even reached the moon yet!

“difficult! but not impossible”

in addition to giving a timetable for the mars project, lao ma also revealed the latest research and development progress on the social platform:

spacex is developing a fully reusable launch vehicle, and its economic viability is crucial.

the key to achieving multi-planetary life is to significantly reduce the cost of delivering cargo to mars.

currently, it costs $1 billion to send a ton of payload to mars, and our goal is to reduce that cost to $100,000 per ton.

in order to build a self-sustaining city on mars, this would mean we would need to make a leap in technology by an order of magnitude.

while this challenge is daunting, it is not impossible.

there is a sense of pride between the lines. let's talk about this.what is spacex's starship?：

(ps: lao ma has also made a related ppt before, let’s take a look at it together~)

let’s talk about the appearance first. the spacex starship is designed to have a height of 121 meters, a diameter of 9 meters, and a take-off mass of approximately 5,000 tons.

it consists of two main parts:super heavy booster and starship spacecraft。

△ thruster

super heavy booster equipment33 unitsraptor liquid rocket engine, with a total thrust close to7600 tons, (capable of lifting an eiffel tower), using liquid oxygen and methane as propellants, with327 secondsthe specific impulse of low-earth orbit can reach150 tonnes。

engine

during the design and development phase, spacex tested multiple prototypes, including starhopper and the sn series, to verify the feasibility of the design.

during the unmanned flight test phase, the starship prototype has conducted 9 flight tests, with flight altitudes ranging from150 meters to 39 kilometersthe success rate is60%。

△flying to mars

not only that, to support the mars program, the starship uses on-orbit refueling technology, allowing refueling in low earth orbit to increase flight distance and payload.

△ mars transportation

it is also equipped with an advanced thermal protection system that can withstand up to3000 degrees celsiustemperature to ensure that the spacecraft isnot burned。

△ mars entry & landing

in terms of landing safety and reliability, it is expected to eventually achieve“airline class”that is to say, apart from flying higher than an airplane, its safety is almost the same!

△ landing

most importantly, this version of the starship canreuse。

in addition, it has multiple variants: including manned starships, cargo starships and tankers, etc., which can adapt to different mission requirements.

lao ma: i miss you so much on mars

musk's mars plan can actually be traced back to 17 years ago (2007):

2007musk publicly expressed for the first time that he hopes humans can explore and colonize mars, setting this flag.

2011in an interview, he expressed his hope to send humans to mars within 10 to 20 years and envision establishing a martian colony with tens of thousands of people.

2012proposed"mars colonial transporter"the concept of using a rocket as a means of transportation for humans to mars. then, spacex began to develop the raptor rocket engine.

2015musk first detailed the space shuttle at the international astronautical congress"interplanetary transport system"the design plans to use a reusable rocket and spacecraft system for mars transportation.

he stressed that reducing the cost of mars travel is the key to success and believes that this can be achieved through a fully reusable rocket system.

△ concept map of the "interplanetary transport system" orbiter

2016lao ma announced at the international astronautical congressBFRconcept, planned for transportation to mars and other planets. set a goal of 2022 for the first mars cargo mission, and plans to send the first humans to mars in 2024. (pictured)

△ starship prototype

2018spacex has begun to build a prototype of the starship as a core part of the future mars transportation system. ma also envisions building a self-sufficient base on mars that can support tens of thousands of people living and working.

△ establishing a mars base

2020musk confirmed plans to launch at least two cargo spacecraft to mars in 2022 to prepare infrastructure and resources.

2022lao ma said that the launch window between earth and mars is once every 26 months, and it is planned to launch four spacecraft to mars in 2024. in addition, the resources of mars must be utilized, and it is planned to use the carbon dioxide and water ice in the martian atmosphere to produce fuel.

2023spacex conducted a launch test of the starship, but the first flight failed.

△ starship explosion

july 2024ma announced that starship will conduct its fifth orbital test flight within four weeks. (starship has previously conducted four orbital test flights, with the third and fourth taking place in march and june 2024.)

but during the fourth test flight, the spacecraft suffered damage during atmospheric re-entry and eventually splashed down in the indian ocean.

the fifth mission may be underway soon, as both the first and second stage rockets used for this mission have successfully completed static fire tests.

september 2024the announcement stated that the first starship to mars will be launched in two years, manned mars flight will be completed within four years, and a human base will be established within 20 years.

as for2026let’s wait and see whether musk can make his ambitions become reality!