Ignition Stage 1
Posted on 09/27/2016 10:25:08 PM PDT by aquila48
Entrepreneur Elon Musk unveiled his contrarian vision for sending humans to Mars in roughly the next decade, and ultimately setting up colonies there, relying on bold moves by private enterprise, instead of more-gradual steps previously proposed by Washington.
Mr. Musk—who in 14 years transformed his closely held rocket company, Space Exploration Technologies Corp., into a global presence—envisions hosts of giant, reusable rockets standing more than 300 feet tall eventually launching fleets of carbon-fiber spacecraft into orbit.
The boosters would return to Earth, blast off again into the heavens with “tanker” spaceships capable of refueling the initial vehicles, and then send those serviced spacecraft on their way to the Red Planet. The rockets would be twice as powerful as the Saturn 5 boosters that sent U.S. astronauts to the Moon. Each fully developed spacecraft likely would carry between 100 and 200 passengers, Mr. Musk said.
His long-anticipated announcement and video simulation came during an international space conference in Mexico, with highlights transmitted across the globe by video feeds and social media.
The grand plan laid out by Mr. Musk lacked specific funding projections, operational specifics or signoff by government officials, emboldening critics who already have called it a science-fiction dream.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
He has already done stuff that most experts gave him zero chance.
Let me guess, he only needs a huge multibillion line of credit from Uncle Sugar?
The Saturn V sent three astronauts 240k miles to the Moon, yet a rocket only twice as powerful will propel 100 people 135million miles to Mars. Been a long time since HS Physics but those numbers seem dubious.
Yuppers.
Musk has to get his head out of the sky, and figure why his hardware is blowing up on the launch pads and on the streets. His companies are hemmoraging cash without US subsidies.
Ain’t no tomorrow unless there’s a today!
Paging Gary Johnson, paging Gary Johnson. Please report to the launch site asap.
Ignition Stage 1
The video mentioned that he would temporarily park the space ship in a near earth orbit and then send up additional fuel for the trip to mars.
Reading between the lines of the article, the actual 100 person craft would not be boosted into orbit fully loaded for the trip to Mars, but sent up empty to be fueled and fitted before the pioneers arrived in orbit on successive launches for the journey. I think that sounds doable. That is where the tankers mentioned in the article come into play. The boost into orbit through our gravity well is the hardest part. The giant engines fired from orbit toward Mars is a piece of cake by comparison.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvR9A4aylc0
Before the ship departs Earth orbit, reusable tankers would top off its fuel supply, much of which would have been spent getting it into orbit.
Then it would coast to Mars at 63k mph, break (the video glosses over this step), enter Mars's thin atmosphere, and land. After disgorging its passengers and cargo, the ship would be refueled (assumes fuel produced on Mars) and blast off for the return to Earth.
For energy enroute, the ship deploys 200 kw worth of solar panels.
This would be stopped dead if Hillary Clinton wins our election and provides a stepping stone for a Socialist government to take over the world.
“Let me guess, he only needs a huge multibillion line of credit from Uncle Sugar?”
More likely over a hundred billion dollar line of credit from a coalition of Governments.
He estimates ten billion just to design and build “preliminary hardware”. His current efforts are fourfold over their initial budgets.
I think that the bottom line is that there is no showstopping physics problem, so it is essentially just a matter of time and money.
Seems likely, if the window is right, leaving Earth’s orbit to circle around and intercept Mars just takes a bit longer burn than leaving Earth’s orbit to go to the moon. The travel time is a lot longer too, however.
Great, liberals can screw up another planet
What could go wrong?
The video showed little people boarding the capsule...
He has an unlimited amount of crony money. He fights against fossil energy to sell his subsidized solar panels. He has put hundreds of thousands out of work and made electricity more expensive for everyone. He’s DEPLORABLE.
Yeah, and I’m only one $3 billion government grant from starting to work on my planned teleportation device.
Phase I: Build 135 million miles of extension cord, with outlets staggered at 300 mile intervals so the ship can recharge.
Illegals, Liberals and Rinks please report to SpaceX, thank you.
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