The technology that SpaceX will use to bring humans into space by 2022

A spacecraft called Starship and a giant first-stage booster vehicle called Super Heavy will be equipped with six and 29 Raptors, respectively.

Billionaire Elon Musk, owner of SpaceX, the company chosen by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to return Americans to the Moon, announced today that the massive Starship Museum will make its first orbital flight in January or February 2022. The spacecraft have already made several semi-flights. orbital, and Musk expects to receive clearance from the US Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) later this year.

NASA has selected the spacecraft to become the spacecraft used as part of the Artemis program to return to Earth’s only natural satellite. The spacecraft mentioned above will need to orbit the moon and send astronauts from the lunar surface no later than 2025.

SpaceX has set up a factory to produce large-scale versions of the Starship. “I think we’ll need about 1,000 ships to go multi-planet,” Musk said. In this regard, he considered that the creation of a massive production line of spacecraft was necessary to achieve long-term goals, and said that the “biggest limitation” to current production is the speed of construction. Raptor spaceship engines.

SpaceX’s spacecraft technology

The Artemis program, launched under the administration of Donald Trump, was due to return to the lunar surface in 2024, but a lack of budget to fund the lunar landing system has pushed that goal back.

Elon Musk has been developing spaceship design for years; The billionaire businessman’s long-term plans are to fill the planet Mars with people. However, for now, it will serve as a lunar lander that will carry astronauts from orbit around the moon to the surface of the satellite.

The spacious cabin and two decompression boxes will allow astronauts to take their walks on the moon, although it is very different from the lunar module (LM) that carried 12 men to the moon as part of the US Apollo program between 1969 and 1972.

“The overall goal of SpaceX was to develop space technology so that humanity could become a multi-planetary species and eventually a space civilization,” said Elon Musk.

Although the US aircraft manufacturer has a $2.9 billion contract with NASA To send astronauts to the moon, Musk insists that the company does not participate in international partnerships and does not resort to outside funding.

Spaceship components

The Starship consists of two parts: a spacecraft called the Starship and a giant first craft called the Super Heavy. Both will be fully reusable and both will be powered by Raptors: 6 for the final ship and 29 for the superheavy ship.

The SN20 prototype designed for first orbital testing will contain six raptors: three standard and three empty. SpaceX is preparing the craft for an expected orbital flight test, a first for the Starship program.

Prototypes have already been released, but they were vehicles with three (at most) engines that reached a maximum height of about 10 kilometers. The SN20 and the super heavyweight known as Booster 4 will be launched from Starbase in Texas.

The launch pad will crash into the Gulf of Mexico, about 20 miles from the launch site. But SN20 will reach orbit, if all goes as planned, and will eventually land on the Hawaiian island of Kauai.