Just over one week ago
SpaceX successfully stacked their massive Starship system at their operations
base in Texas, for the first time using their new “chopsticks” methodology –
grabbing a prototype of the Starship crew vehicle and raising it to the top of a
huge Super Heavy booster. By contrast, NASA continues to perform hoisting
within their gigantic Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center, as
they have recently done with what will be the first Artemis assembly of the
Space Launch System/Orion spacecraft. In a few months Artemis will undertake an
unmanned mission to the moon before crew operations get underway within a year.
As for Starship? The
ultimate goal is a large crew bound for Mars. But last week speculation ran
rampant about exactly what visions SpaceX head Elon Musk might reveal at a scheduled
media gathering and worldwide streaming event in the immediate wake
of the Starship stacking. The
thought was that if Elon said anything hard to believe, we may be the ones that
need to rethink that belief. After all, the amount of progress SpaceX has made
has been stunning. Ten years ago, I toured what was the humble SpaceX
facilities at Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral. To see the visions
presented back then come to fruition has been beyond impressive. And there are
plenty of near-future developments in store. For example, those Starship
chopsticks aren’t just for lifting – the plan is to use them to snatch a
returning booster out of the sky. Impossible? We’ll see about that…
In the aftermath of Musk’s actual remarks at his showy evening Starship status gathering, some observers have expressed disappointment. There was no bold announcement of imminent breakthroughs, just a report on concrete progress. But the very fact that a Starship prototype loomed in the skies above a place now known as Starbase, Texas… Well, that was a statement in itself.
