Per reporter: Wu Linjing Per editor: Liu Yanmei
The starship with an overall fuselage of more than 120 meters and about 40 stories high is a ticket to Mars built by Musk for Earthlings.
How many people want to go to Mars on this "ship"? On October 19, at the salon site of the 2023 Chengdu World Science Fiction Convention "Elon Musk's Dreams and Distances: How SpaceX Refined", when the host threw this question, please raise their hands to the audience who want to go to Mars, a child in the audience couldn't stop exclaiming: "So many people!" ”
The scene of the salon event Photo source: Photo by Wu Linjing, reporter
However, human exploration of space has a long way to go. On April 20, US time, SpaceX's launch starship exploded and disintegrated in the air about 4 minutes after liftoff. In the eyes of outsiders, the plan to travel to Mars on a starship has been hit hard.
But what is still fresh in people's memories is that in the live video of the rocket launch, the SpaceX team exploded with cheers and applause. What are they celebrating, a $3 billion firework? The reporter of "Daily Economic News" got some answers at this salon scene.
Where the "success" of Starship
After the starship exploded and disintegrated in the air, the SpaceX team gave an analysis because the starship suffered an unplanned failure when the booster and spacecraft were stripped. Musk did not think the launch mission was a complete failure, saying that he had learned a lot of lessons to prepare for another launch in a few months, and even posted on social platforms: "Congratulations to the SpaceX team." ”
Lewis Hong, a former SpaceX executive, mentioned at the salon: "Starship is a success as long as it doesn't explode on the launch pad, which is a joke often made within the team." ”
Lewis Hong recalled that in 2012, when the Falcon Nine was not ready, the SpaceX team began to plan and discuss the starship internally. In a picture displayed at the scene, it can be seen that unlike all of SpaceX's rocket series in the past, the starship is designed to be a "behemoth" that transports humans and supplies through the solar system - about 27 meters taller than the Statue of Liberty in the United States.
The far right is the starship Image source: Photo by Wu Linjing, reporter
The breakthrough of the starship is not only "big", but also its "low cost". Lewis Hong said that the construction of the starship has reduced the transportation cost of a kilogram of cargo from $20,000 per kilogram to $100 per kilogram, which is a very important milestone in space infrastructure - the cost has been greatly reduced, making space travel a big step forward from the goal achieved.
The "Daily Economic News" reporter learned that in addition to the recovery and recycling of rockets, there are three major reasons to promote the cost reduction. The first is the scale, the starship can transport 150 to 250 tons of weight, plus it has 1,000 cubic meters of space inside, so large that it can basically disassemble and stack the entire Eiffel Tower, and then transport the whole into space. With such a large space and carrying capacity, it makes the cost per kilogram transported very low. This was followed by fuel, and the starship chose gas as fuel. Finally, the material, the traditional rocket manufacturing material is carbon fiber, but the starship manufacturing material is a special stainless steel, the cost is almost 1/300 of carbon fiber.
Why SpaceX?
There is a law in the investment world that space holds infinite business opportunities, but 90% of commercial companies die on the road. In an interview, Musk was asked "How many space companies are not bankrupt?" He gave a more exaggerated answer of "0".
When Falcon One entered orbit, SpaceX proved to NASA that it was a true rocket company; When the Falcon Nine was recovered, SpaceX's costs were greatly reduced, moving from unprofitable launches to small profits. SpaceX became that "1", and has become a legendary existence in commercial space enterprises today.
The "Daily Economic News" reporter learned from the scene that by 2022, the SpaceX team will launch the Starlink plan to deploy more than 3,000 Starlink satellites in space. Also that year, the number of rockets launched worldwide was 93, of which SpaceX accounted for 61, "in an absolute monopoly," Lewis Hong said.
The reason why SpaceX has grown rapidly over the past decade is, according to Lewis Hong, thanks to the team's culture.
The first is "thinking long-term", SpaceX has never defined itself as a rocket company, and its ultimate mission is to open up the universe. Lewis Hong said that this vision has attracted many talents from all over the world to join the team in Silicon Valley to complete the development of various series of rockets and work hard for their dreams.
The second is that "for any goal, it doesn't feel like a fantasy," Lewis Hong said, and there is a standard within the team, "Anything [the goal] doesn't violate science, doesn't violate physics, etc., can be achieved." ”
Lewis Hong also introduced that Musk is a very dedicated and consistent person at work, "What he said to the outside world, to the team, ten years ago, and what he said now is basically the same." In addition, he always speaks frankly about his goals and expectations when working, and although his standards are easy to understand, they are generally extremely difficult to achieve. ”
These cultures are attractive enough for SpaceX investor Lu Zhang, who said that the innovation ecosystem of commercial space in Silicon Valley is still thriving, and just two months ago, her fund invested in another startup that manages space circulation.
Zhang Lu mentioned that although the entrepreneurial risk of commercial space is high, in Silicon Valley, related entrepreneurship and investment do not end. As an investor in the commercial space field, Zhang Lu values an entrepreneurial belief, "I want to change the world and create wealth, but the most important thing is to change the world."
After decades of development, space technology has long been not limited to launching rockets and satellites, and sci-fi scenes such as space mining and Martian immigration have gradually come into reality. How far humans can travel in space depends on space technology, spacecraft technology, rocket technology, energy technology and so on.
Behind the sea of stars is the hardship of ten years or even decades of sharpening a sword. An explosion is not a "broken halberd", and SpaceX employees cheered for the "feasibility" that the explosion had verified.
Daily economic news