Elon Musk Sets Up Regular Cargo Route to Mars. No stranger to sharing his desire to conduct missions to Mars, SpaceX CEO and founder Elon Musk has yet again begun chattering about his interplanetary ambitions.
In an exclusive interview with the Washington Post last week, Musk not only reiterated his intent on sending a spacecraft to Mars before the end of this decade but also detailed exactly when he plans on sending humans there as well. Equating a journey to the red planet with what it was like for colonists to traverse the Atlantic in search of the New World, he believes it’s utterly paramount mankind become a multi-planet species. In other words, it’s just another day at the office for Musk. Expanding briefly on previous announcements about SpaceX’s affinity with the fourth planet from the Sun, Musk said he’s readying what will be a freight path between Earth and Mars.
First SpaceX Internet Satellites Launched into Space. Musk's space exploration firm has developed technology that allows rockets to take off, deposit their payload into space, and then land back on earth to be reused.
In March for the first time, SpaceX sent one of their reused Falcon 9 rockets back into space to send a communications satellite into orbit. This technology cuts costs, something Cooper referred to. "SpaceX intends to launch the system onboard our Falcon 9 rocket, leveraging significant launch cost savings afforded by the first stage reusability now demonstrated with the vehicle," the executive said. The 4,425 satellites will operate in 83 orbital planes at altitudes ranging from 1,110 KM to 1,325 KM. SpaceX argues that the U.S. lags behind other developed nations in broadband speed and price competitiveness, while many rural areas are not serviced by traditional internet providers. China Launches "Artificial Moon" to Replace City's Streetlights. Posted 18 Oct 2018, 9:35amThu 18 Oct 2018, 9:35am China is reportedly in the process of creating an "artificial moon" that would be bright enough to replace the streetlights in the south-western city of Chengdu by 2020.
Key points: Chinese scientists plan to install three artificial moons by 2022The illuminated satellite is designed to complement the moon at nightThe artificial moon could save hundreds of million of dollars a year in electricity costs. NASA Launches Next Mars Rover. China Launches Reusable Spaceplane. China plans to launch its reusable spaceplane in 2020, according to a statement from China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.
Unlike traditional one-off spacecraft, the new spacecraft will fly into the sky like an aircraft, said Chen Hongbo, a researcher from the corporation. The spacecraft can transport people or payload into the orbit and return to Earth. Chen said that the spacecraft will be easier to maintain and can improve the frequency of launches at lower cost, bringing new opportunities for more people to travel into space. “Currently, China is developing its own reusable earth-to-orbit space vehicles that can take off and land horizontally. They have already finished several crucial ground tests for engines and [other key components], yielding remarkable achievements,” Liu Shiquan, vice director of the China Aerospace Science & Industry Corporation (CASIC), told media at the Global Space Exploration Conference in Beijing.
India Sends Its First Astronauts into Space. Sandhya Ramesh • August 24, 2018 On August 15, during India's Independence Day celebrations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprising announcement: The country will send a humans to space by 2022.
"Our country has made great progress in space," he said. "But our scientists have a dream. By 2022, when it would be 75 years of Independence, an Indian—be it a man or a woman — will go to space with the tricolour flag in their hands. " (Video of announcement in Hindi) SpaceX's Colonial Transporter Heads To Mars. Starting as soon as 2018, Musk’s SpaceX plans to fly an unmanned spacecraft to Mars.
The unmanned flights would continue about every two years, timed for when Earth and Mars are closest in orbit, and, if everything goes according to plan, build toward the first human mission to Mars with the goal of landing in 2025, Musk has said. But in an interview with The Post this week, Musk laid out additional details for the first time, equating the spirit of the missions with the settlement of the New World by the colonists who crossed the Atlantic Ocean centuries ago. And he acknowledged the immense difficulties of getting to a planet that is, on average, 140 million miles from Earth. China Builds First Asteroid Mining Base.
The asteroid mining race is expected to heat up this century.
IN AN effort to mine precious metals potentially worth trillions of dollars and aid interstellar travel, China has unveiled plans to build a base on an asteroid, likely to happen “in the near future”. Ye Peijian, the chief commander and designer of the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program, revealed details that could potentially put an unmanned craft on an asteroid and mine the rock for metals like palladium, platinum and others that are used in items such as smartphones and cars. “In the near future, we will study ways to send robots or astronauts to mine suitable asteroids and transport the resources back to Earth,” Peijian said in comments reported by China Daily. Earlier this year, Peijian said that China could conduct one exploration mission between 2020 and 2025, though no further details, such as the exact date or the asteroid are known. It's one small step for man, one giant opportunity for miners. SpaceX's Mars Technology Used to Connect Cities. Futurist and inventor Elon Musk unveiled ambitious plans Friday to send cargo ships to Mars in five years and use rockets to carry people between Earth's major cities in under half-an-hour.
The founder of SpaceX said a planned interplanetary transport system, codenamed BFR (Big Fucking Rocket), would be downsized so it could carry out a range of tasks that would then pay for future Mars missions. "The most important thing... is that I think we have figured out how to pay for (BFR)," Musk told a packed auditorium at a global gathering of space experts in Adelaide. "Which is to have a smaller vehicle, it's still pretty big, but one that can... do everything that's needed in the greater Earth orbit activity.
" Japan Puts an Astronaut on the Moon.