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After four unsuccessful launches that ended in fiery explosions, SpaceX on Wednesdaysuccessfully launched and landedits Starship rocketship, a stainless steel vehicleElon Muskplans to one day use to shuttle people to and from Mars.
SpaceX said the completed mission was the company’s fifth high-altitude flight test of a Starship prototype from Starbase in Texas — and just so happened to fall on the60th anniversary of the first American to travel in space.
The most recent flight test in March failed after the vehicle “experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly” shortly after the landing burn started.
The outlet reported that a fire at the base of the 160-foot rocket was extinguished quickly.
“Starship landing nominal!” Musk, the CEO and founder of SpaceX, tweeted shortly after.
SpaceX said the point of the test flights are to improve understanding and development of “a fully reusable transportation system designed to carry both crew and cargo on long-duration interplanetary flights, and help humanity return to the Moon, and travel to Mars and beyond.”
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Musk raised eyebrows last month when he said in an interview that"a bunch of people will probably die"in the beginning stages of Mars exploration as experts work out the kinks of traveling to the Red Planet.
“Going to Mars reads like that ad book for [explorer Ernest] Shackleton going to the Antarctic,” Musk, 49, toldPeter Diamandisin a lengthy interview thatstreamed live on YouTubeon Thursday. “It’s dangerous, it’s uncomfortable, it’s a long journey. You might not come back alive. But it’s a glorious adventure, and it’ll be an amazing experience.”
“If we get lucky, maybe four years. We want to send an uncrewed vehicle there in two years,” he reportedly said at an award show webcast from Berlin.
source: people.com
